Wounded Together
by PeachesPoison
Summary: Part one of the City Love series. Les Amis are college students together. One has a drinking problem, one has a secret. They decide to help each other, and they accidentally spiral into a deeper mess than either of them ever could have imagined. M for language, drinking, sex.
1. Mr Brownstone

So, this story is going to be different than anything I've done before. When I'm inspired to write, it's always because of music, particularly the feeling a song wants the listener to feel. I started writing this when I heard one of the songs I'm going to use later, but I do NOT consider this to be a songfic, it is a multi-chapter story with a plot, not a sloppily written one-shot.

That being said, please stick with me, give the Grantaire/Eponine pairing a chance, I promise I'll do it justice!

_I get up around seven, get outta bed around nine  
And I don't worry about nothin' no because worryin's a waste of my time  
The show usually starts around seven, we go on stage around nine  
Get on the bus about eleven, sippin' a drink and feelin' fine_

"Make me understand," Eponine pleaded. Her dark eyes met her friend Grantaire's from across the table. He was slurping down a draft beer, and it was the seventh Eponine had counted him drink in the less than two hours they had been at their usual table at their favorite bar, the Corinth. They were seated at one end of the customary two long booths their group of friends pushed together. It was the first thing Eponine had said in a while, as she was lost in her own thoughts while she counted.

It was a loud Thursday night, and their customary start to the weekend. The bar didn't have a dance floor, just tables full of college students celebrating the almost-end of another week of classes to the soundtrack of some Top 40 radio station. It was home.

"Understand what?" Grantaire asked. He gripped his glass mug with both hands, bringing it slowly to his lips.

Eponine nodded her head toward his mug. "That."

"This is called beer."

"Smart-ass," she said with a roll of her eyes. "I mean that I want to understand why you like to drink so much," she continued, picking her words carefully so as not to offend Grantaire.

"That's an awfully stupid thing to want, Eponine," he grumbled. He cast a furtive glance around the table, not wanting any of his other friends to hear this conversation. Grantaire's drinking habits were, as an unspoken rule, not discussed.

"I mean it," she said softly.

"You don't have to babysit me," Grantaire said over the rim of the mug.

Eponine paused, unsure of her words. She and Grantaire had become closer since Marius, who introduced her to his friends, had started dating a girl named Cosette a few months ago. The two, along with Jehan, had similar majors and had several classes together. When Marius either stopped hanging out with them or always had Cosette at his side, Eponine had gravitated toward Grantaire, and their fierce personalities meshed surprisingly well. She took a deep breath. "I'm not trying to babysit you, or tell you to stop drinking; I'm just trying to understand. I don't know how else to explain this." She grew visibly frustrated.

Grantaire sighed. "Eponine, I drink because I like it. I like it because it numbs me."

"Why do you want to be numb?" she asked quietly, leaning forward and resting her face in her hands. Her dark eyes searched Grantaire's, and her heart raced as the conversation inched closer to her purpose. "Sometimes I think I'd like to be numb, too," she admitted.

_We've been dancin' with Mr. Brownstone  
He's been knockin', he won't leave me alone_

Courfeyrac, who was sitting to Grantaire's right, noticed that the conversation between the two had become serious in nature. Grantaire saw him whisper, in a failed attempt as being discreet, to Combeferre on the other side of him.

"Not here," Grantaire said. He downed the rest of his beer and stood, motioning for Eponine to follow him. "Walking her home," he mouthed in response to Courfeyrac's questioning look behind Eponine's back. Courfeyrac grinned and made a rather crude gesture with his hands, to which Grantaire just rolled his eyes.

The apartment Grantaire shared with Jehan wasn't far from the Corinth, and the night was one of those beautiful March nights that tricked a person into thinking summer had come early. Eponine filled her lungs with the sweet air, searching her brain for a way to continue the conversation. For one of the first times she could remember, words utterly failed her. They walked in silence, beating the familiar path to the apartment she spent so much of her spare time in.

Eponine technically still lived with her parents, just a few metro stops away, but she didn't get along with her family. If she had the money she would have moved out in a heartbeat, but it was easier in her mind to just crash at her friends' apartments. Nobody minded; the friends were more like family. Their courses of study differed greatly, but they all in some way possessed a similar spark of life. It held them together. Eponine was a journalism student, but her focus on writing enabled her to enroll in some of the same classes as Grantaire and Jehan, who were creative writing students.

Once in the apartment, she assumed her usual post in the worn, overstuffed green armchair in one corner of the living room. Grantaire disappeared into the kitchen, she presumed, to get more beer. She tapped her hands anxiously together. She honestly wanted to know what exactly it was about alcohol that so seduced Grantaire and neither had spoken since they left the bar.

_I used to do a little but a little wouldn't do it  
So the little got more and more  
I just keep tryin' to get a little better  
Said a little better than before_

"Here," he said, pressing a bottle of beer to her hand.

"Thanks," she responded, noting that he gave her one beer and brought out three for himself. "That's exactly what I'm talking about, Grantaire." She shot an accusatory look at the coffee table in front of Grantaire's spot on the couch, where he had set down the bottles.

He sighed. "I can't give you a good answer," he finally said. He took a long drink.

"Bullshit," Eponine firmly said before drinking from her own bottle. "Don't you trust me?"

"Of course I do," Grantaire said with a pained expression on his face. He scratched at the slight stubble under his chin. "That's not it at all."

"Words practically bleed from your fingers. You're a terrific writer, and don't try to be humble about it."

Grantaire blushed as he stammered, "This isn't the same. You have to realize nobody has ever actually come out and asked me about my…alcoholism…before."

"You're not an alcoholic," Eponine hastily said.

"Now that's bullshit," Grantaire snorted.

"You aren't some bum passed out in a park. You're a good student, a better friend."

"Eponine, I spend as much time and effort drinking as Enjolras spends devoting to his student government stuff. Except I can't exactly list binge drinking on my resume under the skills section." His words weren't enough to remove her confusion. "Trust me, being an alcoholic doesn't go hand-in-hand with being a failure."

_We've been dancin' with Mr. Brownstone  
He's been knockin', he won't leave me alone_

She contemplated this confession for a second. "What do you mean, about the time and effort part?"

He started on his second bottle of beer, or his ninth for the night. "This is why I can't make you understand no matter how hard I try. You can't possibly comprehend what it's like to sleep for one hour some nights and for 14 hours straight others. Sometimes I start drinking at four in the morning because I can't sleep. I have to pencil drinking in around and during work and school. I have to drink so much to go numb that I can't stop." Grantaire spat the final words out bitterly, his knuckles white where he was clenching the bottle he held.

Eponine sank beside Grantaire on the couch. "I'm sorry," she whispered. She had underestimated the extent of the addiction. "You're right. I don't know what that's like. But I promise you, I know pain. Pain stalks me and makes me want to make a friend of numbness."

Grantaire narrowed his eyes, but he didn't doubt her. One of the reasons they got along so well was that they both liked to live for the present moment. Jehan liked to dwell on the past, and the things he wrote always had slight undertones of melancholy. Other friends of theirs, like Enjolras and Combeferre, were constantly anticipating the future. Eponine and Grantaire usually didn't talk about either the past or the future, but clearly that pretense was abandoned that night. "Tell me about the first time you drank," he said, changing the subject.

Eponine furrowed her eyebrows, sipping her beer. "I didn't really drink in high school. The first time I got drunk was with you guys freshman year, actually. My parents have never had their shit together enough to help me with anything, let alone paying for college. I was either working or studying every second I could."

A small smile played at Grantaire's mouth as he pictured his spitfire friend as a nerd. "Surely you drank at least once?"

"I stole a Mike's hard lemonade once at a sleepover in eleventh grade," she recalled sheepishly. "Why do you ask? I've obviously come a ways since then." To prove her point, Eponine easily chugged the generous amount of beer left in her bottle and helped herself to one of Grantaire's.

"The first time I drank was in eighth grade. I was fourteen. My neighbor Marc was my best friend at the time, and once his older brother got a case of some cheap light beer for us. Three of us choked it down in his garage, as fast as we could. I couldn't understand why adults liked it so much, I used to hate the taste." Eponine pictured a young Grantaire, a bottle to his young lips, his perpetually messy black curls in his face. She shuddered. "Obviously, we got wasted. We walked from his garage down the street to the gas station, committing about a billion social offenses. I thought it was hilarious the next morning when my mum yelled at me until she was red in the face because I puked in the front yard."

"Well, I think you were the normal one and I was the exception, then," Eponine offered.

Grantaire shook his head. "No, it would have been normal if this had been a one-time or even a couple-of-times thing. It turned into every weekend. Marc and I would walk around our neighborhood, sneaking or breaking into garages to see what we could find. We knew which housewives had stashes of liquor and where to find fridges full of what we saw as free booze. It was fun, for a while."

He stopped talking. Eponine noticed the waver in his voice, and she didn't ask him to continue. She turned on his TV for some background noise to fill the deafening silence. "Do you want something to eat?" Eponine asked.

"No," Grantaire answered thoughtfully. "Food kills the buzz. I'm probably only skinny because I don't eat real food."

"Oh," Eponine said. She realized that she hardly ever see him eat, as he put it, real food. Always a snack, like popcorn or fried bar food.

"Anyway, getting drunk on the weekends stopped being enough and I let it get out of hand. I let my friends talk me into a lot of things. I did stop drinking for maybe a year when my mum threatened to send me to rehab after Marc brought me home all kinds of fucked up one day. I'm not sure if she really didn't realize what I was doing or if it just took her to see it in person to admit it to herself.

_Now I get up around whenever, I used to get up on time  
But that old man he's a real motherfucker  
Gonna kick him on down the line_

"I was doing okay until halfway through my senior year, when I realized how badly I wanted to go to college. Writing was the only thing I was ever really good at, other than drinking," Grantaire said with a sad smile. "I got really stressed, once I got accepted here. I've never been good at change."

Eponine interrupted, "I don't know that anyone really likes change."

"Well, I started sneaking beer at night. I told myself it was to help me get to sleep on those nights where I was tossing and turning until I could see the sun coming up outside my window. Except the two it would take to fall asleep turned into ten before I could stop myself." He looked Eponine in the eyes for the first time since he'd started his explanation. She thought his eyes looked caught in a hybrid between vacant and miserable. "And, clearly, I haven't stopped myself since."

_I used to do a little but a little wouldn't do it  
So the little got more and more  
I just keep tryin' to get a little better  
Said a little better than before_

Eponine put her drink down and hugged Grantaire awkwardly. Twice in one night, he left her unable to come up with a single word. When she pulled away, he saw a tear roll down her face. She wiped it away, embarrassed.

"Why are you crying?"

"I didn't mean to." She blinked rapidly, willing the tears to stop.

"I bet you're sorry you asked," Grantaire said. He looked away from her again, staring absently at the TV.

"No. I'll never be sorry for asking, Grantaire," she replied. "Nothing you say could make me stop being your friend. I told you, I want to understand." Eponine put her tiny hand on Grantaire's in a gesture of comfort.

He grimaced. "I'm not sure that you really will, no matter how much I tell you about my dirty laundry."

"Do you remember what I said earlier? Make me understand."

"Eponine, I don't fucking understand why you're so interested. I just drink." He swished the beer in his bottle around for good measure.

"I know you're not drunk enough to forget our conversation at Corinth," Eponine said. "I told you I was no stranger to pain. I've been holding it together pretty well for a while, but I think I'm starting to crack. If you don't help me manage it, I'll find another way."

Grantaire frowned, caught completely off guard. He didn't know exactly what she meant. To him, Eponine had always been strong and independent. "What are you hiding?"

"I'm not hiding anything," she said a little too quickly. "I just don't want to talk about it."

"Even after everything I just told you?"

"Even after that," she nodded.

Grantaire's heart thudded in his chest. He was pretty sure Eponine could hear his thoughts. He was definitely buzzed. His fingers tingled a little bit and he couldn't really feel Eponine's hand on his. He used alcohol to numb his feelings, so the surge of concern washing over him disoriented him.

"Come on," Eponine chided. "You teach me how to drink, I teach you how to feel."

"That's confusing."

She smiled. "Yeah, I know. Whatever. Let's agree to something."

"Something…I'll drink to that, I guess," Grantaire said, raising his drink in a toast. Eponine clinked her bottle to his.

_We've been dancin' with Mr. Brownstone  
He's been knockin', he won't leave me alone  
No, no, no, he won't leave me alone_

Song inspiration for this chapter is Mr. Brownstone by Guns n' Roses. Yes, I know it's slang for heroin and not alcohol but it the sentiment fits here. I promise you'll love Grantaire/Eponine as much as I do eventually. Please let me know what you think of this crazy nonsense I have planned.


	2. Vindicated

A/n: I'm so encouraged by the positive responses! Just a note, I've changed some lyrics slightly and I've probably got some wrong at some point…shhh. It's okay. Just feel the Ep/R love. If I could make gifs, Tumblr would break with my gifs for this pairing, especially this story.

_Hope dangles on a string, like slow spinning redemption  
Winding in and winding out, the shine of it has caught my eye  
And roped me in so mesmerizing, so hypnotizing, I am captivated_

Eponine woke up first the next morning. The TV was off, blankets were thrown over her and Grantaire, and Jehan's door was shut, so apparently he'd come home at some point. The three friends only had one class on Fridays, introduction to photography. It was almost a blowoff, and didn't start until ten in the morning; a cakewalk by anyone's standards. Almost everyone in the class showed up visibly hungover on Fridays anyway, and Eponine realized that this week wouldn't be any different as her head throbbed.

She had fallen asleep on the couch, her head on Grantaire's lap. He was snoring softly. Eponine giggled at the sound, which turned into a cough in her parched throat. She sat up, and the movement woke up Grantaire.

"I'm sorry," she mumbled groggily. "Didn't mean to wake you."

He rubbed his eyes. "It's okay, when's class?"

At this moment, Jehan walked out of his room toward the bathroom. "Dibs on the shower, class in an hour and a half," he informed the other two.

The second the bathroom door shut, Grantaire jumped from the couch and made his way to a cabinet in the small kitchen attached to the living room. Eponine watched him curiously as he took a Gatorade from the fridge.

"Can I have one?" she asked. Her tongue felt like cotton in her mouth.

"Yeah, hold on a sec," Grantaire replied. He rummaged through the freezer until he pulled out a bottle of vodka.

"You're joking," Eponine said dryly. He clearly wasn't. Grantaire twisted the lids off of the plastic bottles of blue Gatorade, and took a few gulps from each. He poured the plain vodka in, filling the bottles the rest of the way and tossed one to her. She caught it with a dumbfounded look on her face.

He drank a sip and smiled in approval. "If you really want to understand me, I think you're going to need to learn how to keep up with me. Just because I hide my morning habit from Jehan doesn't mean I need to hide it from you anymore."

Eponine stood and stretched. Her neck hurt a little from how she fell asleep. "I can't tell if I'm more fascinated or horrified, Grantaire."

"I'm horrified that you're not horrified," he retorted.

Before Eponine could respond, Jehan opened the bathroom door and slunk back into his room. Eponine dashed to the bathroom to snag the shower ahead of Grantaire, but stopped in her tracks. "Do I still have any clothes here?"

"I thought you'd never ask," Grantaire smirked. He retrieved the duffle bag from his room full of random articles of clothing and things Eponine had left in the apartment over the months. She grinned, thanked him, and retreated to shower.

Grantaire returned to the kitchen. Instead of wasting time getting out a glass, he opted to take the bottle of vodka to the face, swallowing a big gulp. He coughed as the liquid burned his throat as it went down, and he washed it down with a cold cup of coffee Jehan had neglected on the counter.

_I am vindicated, I am selfish, I am wrong  
I am right, I swear I'm right, I swear I knew it all along  
And I am flawed, but I am cleaning up so well  
I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself_

He swayed a little bit and gripped the counter. There was something wrong with Eponine. He had known her for nearly three years now. Her personality was many things, but destructive wasn't one of them. He might be a habitual drunk, but he wasn't stupid. He bit his lip. Eponine failed, or passed, depending how you looked at it, the test he threw her way. Grantaire never thought she'd accept freaking vodka to start the day.

Jehan interrupted his train of thought, "Breakfast?" Grantaire just nodded. He sat, slowly sipping his Gatorade (and vodka) while Jehan bustled around the kitchen, singing a tune Grantaire didn't recognize. A few minutes later he set down a plate of toast and eggs. Grantaire didn't even notice, he was so lost in his thoughts.

"Manners, Grantaire, seriously. Maybe Eponine should move in and be your mother," he teased. Jehan smiled, and Grantaire knew he wasn't mad. He had never actually seen Jehan mad. The two of them, kind of an odd couple at first glance, got along well. Unlike Marius, who was naïve bordering on absurdity, or Joly who was a textbook definition of a hypochondriac, it took an awful lot to get either Grantaire or Jehan worked up. The former because he was just good-natured and almost always a little intoxicated, the latter because he was a dreamer who saw the best in everything.

"I think there's something wrong with Eponine," Grantaire murmured. "She's not herself."

"How do you mean?" asked Jehan, taking a bite of toast.

"That's the thing, she won't tell me, and I can't figure it out."

"Hmm," Jehan mused. "Well, give her time. She's not exactly the most…open person we know. Remember when she flipped a whole plate of food on Marius last semester for trying to ask her why she was in a bad mood at Corinth?" Grantaire definitely remembered, as he had to stop Bahorel from trying to take Cosette home while Marius was in the restroom cleaning the remnants of an order of loaded nachos off his clothes.

"Oh I remember."

"Well let's not repeat that now. Eat your eggs," Jehan said kindly.

Grantaire had just enough time for a quick shower before the trio had to leave for class. While the hot water ran around his body, he leaned against the wall to steady himself. He was genuinely curious about Eponine. He considered her one of his closest friends, and he felt awful for not noticing something was wrong sooner. He wondered how he could really be as good of a friend as Eponine insisted he was if he was blind to whatever pain was plaguing her.  
**  
**_So clear, like the diamond in your ring  
Cut to mirror your intentions, oversized and overwhelmed  
The shine of which has caught my eye  
And rendered me so isolated, so motivated  
I am certain now that I am vindicated_

As concerned as he was for his friend, Grantaire was also a 21-year-old man. So as he thought of Eponine, he remembered the way she curled against him the night before. He wasn't sure if he was kidding himself or not, but he felt that whatever was hurting her wasn't touching her last night while she slept safe in his lap. They'd never hooked up, but he would have been lying if he said he hadn't thought about it. Eponine was beautiful in an almost exotic kind of way, tan skin, long dark hair, and those eyes that could look right through him. And those lips that could, obviously, convince him to do anything.

He was just about to move his hand down to touch himself, when the door to the bathroom banged open. "Grantaire, we have to leave in like ten minutes, hurry the hell up," Eponine squeaked.

"Damn it, Eponine, you can't just barge in here!" He immediately stopped what he had been about to do, for she had actually managed to scare him.

He heard her laugh from outside the shower. "First of all, I can't see through the shower curtain, in case you forgot." Grantaire wasn't sure about that. "Secondly, you don't have time to jerk it. Hurry up," she teased, shutting the door behind her. Grantaire's mouth dropped in surprise.

An hour later, the three friends were sitting in class, which was halfway over. Their professor spent the first half of the class explaining black and white film techniques, and now asked the class to split into small groups to discuss some photos he passed out to them. Jehan and Grantaire sat beside each other, Eponine behind Grantaire, easily forming a group.

Eponine had been sipping her spiked Gatorade all through class, and was nearly finished with it. Grantaire, naturally, had finished one before class and had made a quick second one while Jehan's back was turned. Eponine, her tolerance not of the same caliber as Grantaire's, was a little pink in the face and much more talkative than she normally would have been before noon on a Friday.

"I think this one would look a lot better in color," Jehan said as he examined one of the photos they had been assigned. "It just seems like it would tell a much better story that way." He looked up, seeking a response from the other two, just in time to see Eponine toss back the last mouthful of her drink. She scrunched up her face as it went down and Grantaire laughed at her. "You aren't even paying attention," Jehan moaned.

"Sorry, we are, I promise," Grantaire said.

"Yes, Jehan, please continue," Eponine encouraged. Just as he started speaking again, she dissolved into a fit of giggles. "There's a squirrel on that one," she explained, pointing at a corner of the picture.

Jehan rubbed his forehead, exasperated. "There aren't any squirrels in this picture."

"Yes! Yes yes there are. Look right there," she pointed again. Grantaire had his head down on his desk as he couldn't suppress his laughter.

"Are you drunk or something?" Jehan asked, half-teasing. At the horrified look on Eponine's face, he just rolled his eyes. "Unbelievable."

Grantaire picked his head up with a start. Nobody was supposed to know what they were up to, at least not yet. He was a second away from panicking when Jehan continued, "You're idiots. You're still drunk from last night, well, this morning, aren't you?"

"Yes," Grantaire immediately said. "We got a little carried away, I'm sorry."

"Figured as much when I came home at three with the TV blaring and you two passed out."

Eponine frowned, suddenly serious. Fortunately, she followed Grantaire's lead and just went with Jehan's explanation. "I'm sorry Jehan, I'm just feeling a little lightheaded and…silly right now."

For the rest of the class, Eponine sat in near silence, terrified at having nearly been caught. She realized that it easily could have been their professor, and not Jehan, to call her out on her behavior. The guys recorded their opinions on the group response sheet, and Grantaire sighed with relief as their professor dismissed them.

Jehan left to find Feuilly for lunch, giving the other two a warning look as he walked away. "That was too close," Grantaire said as he and Eponine walked out of the building. She automatically chose the path that would take them back to Grantaire's apartment.

"I'm really, really, sorry," she said slowly, still stumbling over her words.

Grantaire stopped walking, and lightly grabbed her shoulders. "Eponine, don't you dare apologize. I did that to you," he said sadly. His buzz was the only thing keeping him calm, dulling the guilt he supposed he should have felt.

"You did not! I chose to drink. I chose this for myself," she said, shrugging out of his grasp to continue walking. "This is what I need."

Grantaire caught up to her and just shook his head. "The sooner I figure you out, the better."

"Who says you're going to?"

"I am going to," he insisted. "I care about you too much not to."

Eponine just pressed her lips together and continued walking. Most of the walk passed in this fashion before she asked, "Can I take a nap?"

Grantaire nodded. "I usually nap before Friday nights. Have to recharge the batteries, so to speak."

Once in the apartment, Eponine crawled into Grantaire's bed before he could say anything otherwise, but he wasn't confident that he would have anyway. He cleaned up their mess from the previous night in the living room, folding the blankets and throwing away the empty bottles and a bag of chips he didn't remember them eating. By the time he returned to his room, Eponine was asleep. She painted a stark contrast against the plain white sheets.

He watched her sleeping for a minute, his heart swelling with concern. She looked so young and carefree while she was sleeping, no worried furrows on her face. "I'm going to take care of you, I promise," he whispered. He walked toward his bed, pausing when his foot kicked a pair of jeans that he realized must have been hers. Which he then realized meant she was in his bed, wearing only panties and a t-shirt. He sighed, admitting that this was going to be a lot harder than he anticipated.

_So turn up the corners of your lips, part them and feel my fingertips  
Trace the moment, fall forever  
Defense is paper thin, just one touch and I'd be in  
Too deep now to ever swim against the current  
So let me slip away, let me slip away_

Grantaire hesitated for a moment, torn between taking a pillow and sleeping on the couch and crawling into his own bed. Eponine sleepily blinked her eyes open. "Come here," she requested, so quietly that Grantaire thought he might have imagined it. But he obliged.

Every movement that took him closer to Eponine, his brain screamed at him not to, he was getting too close. He was caring too much and becoming too invested. But his heart pulled him closer, saying that they needed each other, that they could heal each other. He teetered on the brink for a moment, and then crawled into bed, scooping Eponine into his arms. He fell asleep holding her, and it was done. They'd passed a point of no return.

_Slight hope, it dangles on a string  
Like slow spinning redemption_

I hope this is making sense and the song thing isn't too stupid. This chapter goes with Vindicated by Dashboard Confessional. My taste in music is really all over the place.


	3. Big Machine

_Ecstasy is all you need, living in the big machine now, oh, you're so vain  
Now your world is way too fast, nothing's real and nothing lasts  
And I'm aware, I'm in love but you don't care_

A few hours later, Eponine woke up. She was a little dizzy and unfamiliar with being hungover by dinnertime. For a few seconds, she was comfortable. She was warm, and Grantaire hadn't let go of her while they were sleeping. It scared her, to be honest. She wasn't used to affection being given so freely, with nothing expected or demanded in return.

Eponine looked at Grantaire's sleeping form. He wasn't that much bigger than she was. Maybe a few inches taller, a little more filled out. She liked hugging him because she could so easily put her head on his shoulder, like it was made for her. She put a hand on the side of his face, her thumb tracing the line of his cheek.

"Hey," she said quietly. He showed no sign of waking. She touched his shoulder and shook him, gently.

"Ponine," he mumbled.

"Why did you call me that?"

"Why are you asking me questions right now?"

"It isn't exactly morning, Grantaire."

He blinked the sleep from his eyes. "I don't know, I just said it. Geez."

Eponine sat up. "I guess it's okay," she permitted.

Grantaire smiled. This girl knew no bounds; deciding what others could and could not call her. He looked at the clock on his desk. The glowing green numbers declared that it was 6:38 in the evening. "Shit, we slept forever," he said, as he sat up too.

"Do you have to be at work?" Eponine asked, the worry of being alone evident in her tone.

"No, I don't work again until tomorrow. Noon to close." Grantaire worked at the campus library.

"What are we doing tonight?"

Grantaire smiled. He liked the suggestion that she wasn't leaving yet. He knew her parents didn't give a shit where she was, but he was sort of flattered that she wanted to spend her time with him. Sure, they were friends, and she crashed on the couch a lot, but never two nights in a row. "I don't know yet," he admitted.

She yawned and stretched, climbing over Grantaire to get out of his bed. He inhaled sharply as she gripped his legs as she rolled over them. He watched her walk to the mirror he had hanging behind his door, her gray fitted t-shirt riding up, her ass swaying in white lacy underwear. Grantaire forced his eyes away, and reached for his phone. He typed out a quick text to their friends, asking what was going on that night.

Without warning, Eponine opened the door and walked out of the room. Grantaire wasn't sure if Jehan was home or not, and he scrambled to the door after Eponine, still in his jeans and polo from earlier. "What are you doing?" he hissed in a panic.

She stopped and raised an eyebrow at him. "Finding food, duh." She walked into the kitchen and proceeded to find a box of macaroni and cheese, which she started to prepare. Grantaire looked, and saw Jehan's door was closed, meaning he was probably in the apartment. He strode to the couch and flopped down.

"So what are you going to do if Jehan comes out here?"

"Give him some macaroni, probably," she said nonchalantly.

"Is putting clothes on in your agenda anywhere?" Grantaire finally choked out. He wasn't sure how long he could function with half of her ass hanging out of those panties. As if she could read his mind, Eponine smirked.

_Turn your anger into lust, I'm still here but you don't trust at all, and I'll be waiting  
Love and sex and loneliness, take what's yours and leave the rest  
So I'll survive, God, it's good to be alive_

"Why don't you make me a drink," she suggested. Grantaire was surprised. When he agreed to help her use alcohol to protect herself from whatever pain was plaguing her, he hadn't anticipated her appetite for the poison to be as insatiable as his. His curiosity was killing him.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, and he read the text Courfeyrac sent him. "Alright. Courf says they're going to a hookah bar, then going out somewhere after, but he's not sure where yet."

Eponine scrunched her face. "I don't like hookah. Can we just pregame here or something?"

Grantaire's heart pounded in his chest. "Sure. Do we have anything in the fridge to mix the vodka with?" Eponine turned from her mac and cheese on the stove to look in the fridge. She triumphantly pulled an unopened carton of orange juice out and set it on the counter.

A few minutes later, she joined him on the couch, placing two bowls of mac and cheese beside the screwdrivers she made. Grantaire flicked through the channels, settling on some ghost hunting show. Eponine snickered at his choice. "Do you have a better idea?" he asked indignantly.

"Actually, I do," she said. She disappeared into his room, and came back a minute later with a sheet of paper, a black marker, and scissors. He watched curiously as she drew what appeared to be a handlebar mustache and cut it out, attaching a piece of tape he hadn't noticed she was carrying. "We," she announced, "are going to drink every time this mustache aligns with someone's face." She walked to the TV and stuck the mustache to the screen, grinning from ear to ear.

_And I'm torn in pieces, I'm lying there waiting for  
My heart is reeling, I'm blind and waiting for you_

Grantaire's smile matched hers. "You never cease to surprise me," he said, before taking a gulp from his glass.

"Hey!" she exclaimed. "That's cheating! It didn't match up yet."

"What are you going to do about it?" he asked, feigning innocence.

"Fucking brat," she muttered.

They passed the next few hours this way, teasing each other and laughing hysterically each time the silly mustache lined up just right on someone's face. Jehan exited his room to meet up with their friends, and Eponine assured him they would be joining soon.

Grantaire fell harder for her with each comment she made and each look she threw his way, each smile she gave him. At one point when she got up to make them both another drink, the number of which they had lost track, she returned and sat closer to him. Their thighs were touching; Grantaire's clad in denim and hers still bare. She never did get properly dressed. They were both quite drunk.

"So, you're telling me drinking like this stops being fun at some point?"

"It does," Grantaire admitted. He set his blue eyes to her dark brown ones.

"Well, I'm having fun right now," she said. Eponine, without warning, leaned in and kissed Grantaire.

_Silly love with all your sins, where you stop and I begin- and I'll - I'll be waiting  
Living like a house on fire, what you fear is your desire  
It's hard to deal; I still love the way you feel_

He reacted the only way he could, and set his drink down on the coffee table so that both of his hands were free to cup her face. He hungrily kissed her back, and his tongue parted her lips. Her hands flew to his sides, inching under his shirt. She leaned into him until she was practically on top of him. Grantaire felt himself harden, aching to be released from his jeans.

"Eponine," he started to say. She shushed him with another kiss, and expertly pulled his shirt off over his head. His mind was begging him to stop, telling him it was too much. He couldn't stop even if he had wanted to, though. Eponine, in her simple t-shirt and underwear, was more intoxicating to him than alcohol had ever been.

Hesitating slightly, but egged on by the way she rocked her hips into him, Grantaire removed her shirt too. She grinned and moved a hand down to stroke him through his jeans. He groaned, and his eyes rolled back in his head for a second. Eponine devilishly dropped to the floor on her knees, unbuttoning his jeans as she did so. Grantaire briefly thought that he should probably text Jehan and inform him not to expect them.

Eponine slid his jeans off, leaving him in his black boxer briefs. He drank in the sight of her body as she reached behind her back, unclasping her bra, which fell to the floor. Grantaire thought maybe this was a dream, and he should be waking up any second, but then his underwear was gone too, and Eponine's mouth on him was nothing he could have imagined.

_Now this angry little girl, drowning in this petty world, and I'm who you run to  
Swallow all your bitter pills, that's what makes you beautiful  
You're all a lot; I don't need what you ain't got_

She held him with her left hand, her right resting on his side. She worked her hand up and down, swirling her tongue in ways that made Grantaire moan with pleasure. He arched into her hot mouth. Just as he thought maybe he was going to come, she pulled away. "Condom?" she asked.

He nodded. "Nightstand drawer," was all he was able to get out. She disappeared to his room but came back quickly, tearing the foil open and sheathing Grantaire's dick. Eponine whisked off those panties that had been teasing Grantaire for hours. She was about to mount him when he grabbed her and gently laid her back on the couch. Her eyes betrayed the desire she was feeling, and he moved a hand down to feel her wetness. She whimpered.

That whimper was all he needed to break down any last bit of resolve he had. He plunged into her, slowly at first. Her hips rocked up to meet his, establishing a rhythm, encouraging him. Grantaire couldn't tear his eyes away from Eponine, memorizing the way her breasts looked as her chest heaved with the breaths she was gasping for and the way her mouth opened when she moaned his name.

Her hands reached up to tangle in his hair, and his moved to her breasts to massage her nipples. Eponine tensed, and Grantaire felt her clench around him before she arched into him forcefully, her body shaking as she came. He had been trying with all he could muster to wait for her, and as soon as he was satisfied that he got her off, Grantaire let go, driving into her faster until he came.

Eponine locked her eyes with Grantaire's as he pulled out of her and got up to go clean himself up. "Not bad," she laughed as she walked into the kitchen.

"Oh, that's all you have to say?" he said back.

_And I'm torn in pieces, I'm lying there waiting for  
My heart is reeling, I'm blind and waiting for you_

"That's not nearly all I have to say," Eponine replied, her words laced with more than one meaning. "A toast?" she asked, handing Grantaire his freshly filled glass. He bumped his glass to hers before downing it in one go. He wasn't sure how he was going to fall asleep with this angel next to him.

Soon, they retired to his room for the night. When Jehan came home a few hours later, he saw a pair of lacy white underwear on the floor in front of the couch. His mouth dropped open, and he blushed furiously before dashing into his room, slamming the door.

_And I can't believe it's coming true  
God, it's good to be alive, I'm still here waiting for you  
And I can't believe it's coming true, I'm blind and waiting for you_

Song courtesy of Big Machine by the Goo Goo Dolls. I blame my 90's alt rock Pandora station for the vast majority of the songs here. Don't judge.


	4. LG FUAD

_Let's get fucked up and die (I'm speaking figuratively, of course)  
Like the last time that I committed suicide (social suicide)  
I'm already dead on the inside but I can still pretend  
With my memories and photographs, I have learned to love the lie_

Grantaire woke up the next morning to loud knocking on his door, hearing Jehan yelling at him. His head spun. He looked at Eponine, still sleeping next to him. He threw his comforter over her and yelled to his roommate, "Just come in already, for fuck's sake."

Jehan opened the door cautiously, slowly tiptoeing his way in. "I just wanted to remind you that you have to be at work in two hours," he said. His eyes scanned the room, obviously looking for Eponine. He snorted when he noticed the figure underneath the blanket beside Grantaire.

Grantaire met his eyes. "Please don't tell anyone," Grantaire said. "Not yet."

"Why?" Jehan asked, leaning against the door frame.

Grantaire blushed, the uncharacteristic rosy color spreading across his face. "Last night…was the first time this has happened," he stammered. He was barely awake, and too hungover. Thinking was hard. "Just don't tell anyone yet, please?"

"Okay," Jehan nodded. "I have to go to work too, wanna just stay in tonight?" He thought Grantaire could use a little recovery time.

"Yeah, that sounds good," he agreed. "I'll pick up a case on my way home from work."

"See you later," Jehan said. "Tell Eponine bye for me," he added with a devilish smile before shutting Grantaire's door.

Grantaire shook his head, his mop of black curls sticking out in all directions. He woke Eponine up, dreading the conversation. He wondered if she even remembered last night, since it was a little fuzzy for him. She smiled sleepily at him.

He took a deep breath. "Hey, I just want to cut to the chase, I'm sorry, this is really awkward and hard and weird," he trailed off, not sure what to say next.

Eponine sat up next to him. She squinted her eyes, and Grantaire guessed she was searching her mind in an effort to recall. He squirmed nervously, terrified in anticipation of her reaction. "It's okay," she said. "We fucked. It was fun. It was good," she grinned.

"That's it?" Of the scenarios Grantaire had run through in his head, this was not one of them. He was expecting her to tell him she hated him, or at least make sure he knew she regretted it.

"Yeah, that's it." Eponine stood. "I'm gonna go, my parents probably think I've died or something, can't wait to burst their bubble. Do you want to hang out tonight?"

"Sure," Grantaire said. "I'll text you after work, Jehan wants to stay here tonight I think."

"That's fine. See you later," she said.

Grantaire stared after Eponine as she walked out of the room. He stayed in his bed as he heard her rustle around the apartment, collecting her things, and leaving. "What the fuck just happened?" he muttered to himself.

A few hours later, Grantaire was partway through his shift at the checkout desk of the library. He forgot to bring a drink with him, and he was feeling achy and nervous. He chewed his fingernails absentmindedly, trying to make sense of what happened the night before. He didn't even notice that Courfeyrac was standing on the other side of the desk in front of him until the other man cleared his throat pointedly.

"Oh, sorry, Courf," Grantaire apologized.

"You didn't show up last night," Courfeyrac accused. "What gives?" He leaned on the counter toward Grantaire.

"I was at my apartment with Eponine and Jehan," Grantaire said. "Eponine doesn't like to smoke, and we drank too much and just passed out."

Courfeyrac smiled. "And you fucked her."

"No. Stop it."

"You totally boned her." Grantaire didn't often get embarrassed, but his blush gave him away. Courfeyrac pumped a fist in the air. "I KNEW it! What was it like? Did you tell Maris you're Eskimo brothers yet?"

"Shut the fuck up!" Grantaire hissed. "And no, I didn't tell him, thanks for reminding me," he said sarcastically. "I'm trying to work."

"Bullshit, R. There's nobody here, you fucking liar." It was true. The library was nearly deserted at six in the evening on a Saturday.

"It was a one-time thing, okay?"

"Do you want it to be?"

_I wanna know what it's like to be awkward and innocent, not belligerent  
I wanna know how it feels to be useful and pertinent and have common sense  
Let me in, let me in to the club, cause I wanna belong, and I need to get strong  
And if memory serves, I'm addicted to words and they're useless in this department_

The question caught Grantaire off guard. "I don't know," he said truthfully, with a shrug. "Is she really over Marius?"

"He's dating Cosette," Courfeyrac said.

"No shit. That doesn't mean she's over him. Besides, I'm too fucked up for her. She's too fucked up for me, I think."

"I think you just like saying the word 'fuck' when you talk about her," Courfeyrac laughed.

"You're such an ass," Grantaire said, looking around the library for his boss. "You're going to get me fired."

"It's really, really hard to get fired from a work study job. Especially this one," Courfeyrac mentioned.

Grantaire gritted his teeth. "You wanna come over later? See for yourself."

"You're hanging out with her tonight?" Grantaire nodded at him. "You're falling for her, man."

"Maybe I am. I don't know. She just kind of left this morning, we didn't really even talk about it. I tried to apologize and she said it was okay that it happened and she left." Grantaire purposely left out the fact that Eponine said it was good. Courfeyrac didn't need that detail in his arsenal of information to use against him later.

Courfeyrac shook his head knowingly. "Say no more, R. Let's do a power hour tonight. Start at ten?"

At promptly half past nine, Courfeyrac rang the doorbell to Grantaire and Jehan's apartment, a case of beer under his arm. Eponine answered the door. "Hey, Courf. Come on in," she said sweetly.

"You live here, Eponine?" he joked, shooting a look in Grantaire's direction. Grantaire looked like he wanted to disappear on the spot. Eponine flipped Courfeyrac off. Jehan sighed. It was going to be a long night.

The four of them sat around the coffee table. "Alright, here's how this works," Courfeyrac explained as he passed a shot glass to each of them. "At ten, we start a power hour. Each minute, we take a shot of beer."

"Six cans in an hour?" Eponine asked.

"Precisely," Courfeyrac said with a crooked grin. He kept the case beside him for easy access, and passed a can to each of them. They opened their cans and filled the shot glass in front of them. "I have an app on my phone that changes the song every minute. So every time the song changes, we drink." He set his phone on the table between them, as if it was a radio.

"That doesn't sound too hard," Eponine said to no one in particular.

"Trust me," Jehan said, "It is easy for a while. Those last twenty minutes are a real struggle, though."

_Let's get fucked up and die, I'm riding hard on the last lines of every lie  
And the BMX bike of my life is about to explode, I'm about to explode  
I'm a mess, I'm a wreck, I am perfect, and I have learned to accept all my problems and shortcomings  
Cause I am so visceral, yet deeply inept_

9:59. Courfeyrac said, "Alright, guys, get ready! He picked up his shot glass in his left hand and poised his right hand above the "Start" button on the power hour app on his phone. "Go!" They each tossed back their first shot of beer.

10:18. Things were starting to get a little challenging. Grantaire couldn't help but shoot a worried look Eponine's way. He and the guys had done this many a time before, but they hardly ever finished. They usually got bored or distracted or something, but Courfeyrac seemed determined to get them thoroughly wasted tonight.

10:37. Things were getting a _lot_ challenging. Grantaire wasn't used to drinking on command, and Jehan was having difficulty pouring beer into his shot glass without getting an equal amount on the floor. Courfeyrac was keeping careful watch on Eponine, clearly planning something. Grantaire had to give her credit though; she was keeping her composure better than Jehan was.

10:51. Even Courfeyrac groaned each time the song changed. It was hard to drink that much beer in an hour, and the strain was starting to show. They were racing each other to the bathroom in between songs, after all, all that liquid had to go somewhere.

11:05. The power hour was officially over, but nobody moved yet. "Okay, that was definitely harder than I thought it would be," Eponine said with a grimace. She rose and walked to the restroom.

"Is that what she said last night?" Courfeyrac asked Grantaire as soon as she was out of earshot, a smile playing at the corners of his attempt of a stoic mouth.

Grantaire barely registered the joke before he sprang at Courfeyrac with a feral snarl. Jehan barely stopped him from landing a punch straight to Courfeyrac's face. "Stop it!" he yelled. Jehan _never _yelled. He made it sound like an order, and it was enough to get Grantaire to freeze. "Grantaire, it was kinda funny. Courf, don't do that again anyway."

Eponine returned to the living room just in time to see Grantaire scramble back to where he had been sitting. She didn't ask. She spent too much time hanging out with guys for something like that to be unusual. Also, she was a little too drunk to care. "You want to play 'I never'?" she suggested.

Grantaire groaned. Courfeyrac smiled a mile wide. "That sounds like the best idea ever," he said. He passed each of them another beer. Jehan was torn between feeling bad for Grantaire and dying to know what statements Courfeyrac would come up with. The latter side won.

"Come on, R, it could be fun!" he said.

"I hate you all," Grantaire said through his teeth.

_I want to thank you for being a part of my forget-me-nots and marigolds  
And all the things that don't get old  
Is it legal to do this? I surely don't know  
It's the only way I have learned to express myself, through other peoples' descriptions of life  
I'm afraid I'm alone and entirely useless in this department_

Eponine flopped back down beside Grantaire. She raised her left hand, prompting the others to do the same. "I'll start," she offered. "I've never….driven a truck."

Courfeyrac snorted, "That's stupid." Grantaire put down a finger.

"I just wanted at least one normal question before you bring up all sorts of perverse subjects," Eponine retorted.

"Fair enough," he said. "I've never had sex in this apartment." There was an absolutely evil gleam in his eyes, Grantaire thought.

He expected Eponine to take offense or just lie, but she calmly put down a finger along with Grantaire and Jehan. Courfeyrac couldn't believe it had been that easy, and took the opportunity to ask, "Oh really, Eponine? You think you can divulge that information in my presence and not tell me more?"

Even though she was a little drunk, she didn't miss a beat. "Grantaire fucked me pretty good last night. Several times. Need any more details for your mental spank bank or is that enough?" She casually raised her beer to her mouth and drank.

"You win," Courfeyrac conceded. Jehan was doubled over with laughter. Grantaire was terrified. He hadn't expected the information to become public knowledge so quickly, and now it would only be a matter of minutes before Courfeyrac texted every mutual friend they'd ever had. He didn't want to deal with the fallout yet; he didn't even know what he wanted or what Eponine wanted, and how the fuck did her curiosity about his drinking habits lead to this so quickly?

"I'm not drunk enough for this," Grantaire mumbled.

_Let's get fucked up and die, for the last time with feeling  
We'll try not to smile as we cover our heads and drink heavily into the nights that still shock and surprise  
I believe that I can overcome this and beat everything in the end  
But I choose to abuse for the time being, maybe I'll win, but for now I've decided to die_

"I have one!" Jehan exclaimed. "I've never had a tattoo." All three of his friends put a finger down. "Really?" he asked Courfeyrac at the same time Grantaire and Eponine asked each other the same thing. Neither of them remembered seeing ink on the other one the night before.

"Drunk mistake," Courfeyrac shrugged. "Shamrock on my ass cheek."

Grantaire decided it was high time to target Courfeyrac back. "I've never made out with a guy," he said with a smug look on his face. All three of his friends were silent, giving him a look that made him uncomfortable.

It was Eponine who spoke up. "Grantaire, you sure about that?"

"Of course," he said with a hint of annoyance.

Jehan pulled his phone out of his pocket, laughing so hard that he was almost crying. He flicked through his photos until he found the one he was seeking, and he held it up so Grantaire could see. It was a picture of him kissing Enjolras in a fraternity house basement. Grantaire made a mental note to avoid blacking out so often in public.

"We actually thought you were gay for a little while, that you had a crush on Enjolras or something," Eponine said carefully.

"Oh," was all Grantaire could say. He would never tell them this, but he sometimes followed Enjolras like a puppy because he was insanely jealous. He thought maybe if he wasn't an alcoholic he could have been like his charismatic friend, a respected student leader. In Enjolras he saw everything he thought he would never be. "Well, no."

Courfeyrac couldn't believe his luck. This night was ten times more entertaining than he could have ever hoped. "Eponine," he said to her, "I think you need to hang out with us more often."

"I think I could manage that," she said with a small smile.

A few hours later, Courfeyrac was passed out in Jehan's bed, an irritated Jehan was snoring on the couch in the living room, and Grantaire found himself once again in his bed with Eponine. They were both wasted. She fell asleep the second her head hit the pillow. Grantaire had so much he wanted to say to her, and so much to ask her, but he couldn't bring himself to wake her up.

_Sister soldier, you've been such a positive influence on my mental frame  
If I could ever repay you, I would, but I'm hard up for cash and my memory lacks initiative  
God damn the liquor store's closed, we were so close to scoring  
It hurts, it destroys 'til it kills  
I am tired and hungry and totally useless in this department_

Thank you all so much for the encouragement! I'm so happy that people actually like this. I have no idea how many chapters this is going to end up being but I know I'm nowhere near done. This song is L.G. FUAD (Let's Get Fucked up and Die) by Motion City Soundtrack.


	5. Suspended

I don't even like this chapter but it sets up some good stuff, I promise! I rewrote it a million times. Also, I hope everyone liked my Enjolras explanation in the last chapter and this one… I couldn't resist. I'm such a fangirl for E/R that I even had to justify it to myself XD.

_When you lead me and fit around my tongue it's so easy to forget that I'm lost  
Spent all of my life waiting for answers to lift me, to numb me, to define it all_

"You poisoned me," Eponine moaned the next morning. She had refused to move from Grantaire's bed and it was nearly noon. He was starting to panic. "This is the worst hangover I've had since freshman year," she grumbled into a pillow. Courfeyrac sat on top of Grantaire's desk, and Jehan had since claimed back his own bed.

"Yeah, I'm thinking you're the driver of the struggle bus today, Eponine," Courfeyrac said from his perch. He tentatively nibbled on a slice of cold pizza he found in the fridge.

"I honestly don't know how old that pizza is," Grantaire warned. His friend just shrugged and kept eating. Grantaire shook his head.

Eponine shushed them. "Kindly shut the fuck up about food. And everything else. I feel like death."

Grantaire didn't know how to handle this. Usually he just slept off his hangovers or continued drinking to make the headaches and stomachaches go away. Nursing other people to health wasn't in his area of expertise. He was trying to find the right combination of comforting words to say when Eponine, nearly as pale as his sheets, made a mad dash for the bathroom. The sounds of her puking echoed down the hall to the two men.

Courfeyrac smirked, and Grantaire threw the nearest pillow he could reach at him. "Jackass." Grantaire took to the task of checking his phone, making sure he (and Eponine) hadn't done anything _too_ stupid in the world of social media in their drunken stupor.

He didn't see anything more embarrassing than usual, which was fortunate. Eponine returned to the bedroom while he was working on this task. "I'm sorry," she croaked. She was actually crying. "I used your mouthwash."

All traces of humor fled Courfeyrac's face and he took her tears as his cue to leave. Tears were so not his thing. "Thank you," Grantaire mouthed over Eponine's head to him as she cried into his shoulder.

"Hey, hey, what's wrong, Ponine?" Grantaire felt like he was living someone else's life. This wasn't him, he wasn't someone others came to for comfort. His friends gravitated toward him for his snarky wit and quick tongue, his good-natured humor. Ever since Eponine asked him, just a few days ago, why he liked to drink so much, he felt like his world was whisked out from under him. "It's…okay if you used my mouthwash?" He wasn't sure that this was what she was apologizing for, but it was his best guess.

"No, I'm just sorry, okay?" She spat out in between sniffles. "This is stupid. I don't like being hungover and I don't like being embarrassed and now you and Courf have seen me make a total ass of myself and I don't think my head is ever going to stop hurting."

_Sunshine, I'm beginning to like this  
Cause all I want to be is the minute that you hold me in  
When you pretend that I'm all that you waited for  
Time slips to nothing and I'm better than I've ever been; I'm suspended_

Grantaire didn't know where to start. He wanted to ask her all of the questions that had been playing on a loop in his mind ever since the night before. When he looked at her, her eyes filled with tears and pain and sadness, he could only remember one question that mattered. "Eponine, please tell me what's wrong with you."

"I can't," she said through clenched teeth. "You said this would make me better, Grantaire."

She didn't lay a finger on him, but he felt like he'd been slapped anyway. "I'm not trying to hurt you. You told me I can't fix you either. Is that what you wanted out of this? I don't even know what this is! What do you want, Eponine?"

"I don't know!" she screamed at him. He was absolutely terrified, and he reacted in the only way his body could think to do. He pressed his lips gently to hers in a desperate attempt to get her to stop crying, to stop screaming.

She pushed him back on to the bed, kissing him back fiercely. Grantaire had never kissed someone who was crying before, and the taste of the salty tears mixing in their mouths surprised him. Then again, everything this girl did surprised him. She pulled away all of a sudden, her hands still tangled in his hair.

"You really want to know?" He nodded in return. She rolled off of him and burrowed back under the blankets.

"Eponine, I don't know what we're doing. A week ago, if someone had told me I would be waking up in bed with you more than once, I would have laughed my ass off."

She smiled. "This is exactly it. You have deluded yourself into thinking that you're not worthy of other people because you like to drink. Tough shit. I like hanging out with you, and I really like kissing you, and I'm really enjoying having sex with you." The bluntness of her words sucked all the air out of Grantaire's chest. "You have no idea what I've been through, and I'm starting to realize that I'm just as deluded as you are if I think I can understand you either."

_With your breathing, filling up my lungs, I can almost believe that I'm almost enough  
Spent all of my life emptied of anthems and bracing for something that never did come_

Grantaire's head was spinning. Between his hangover and these _feelings_ he wasn't sure of anything. "So what is this, then, that we're doing? Because three days ago we agreed to _something_ and I thought it was just drinking. It's not fair that you want me to drink with you, and then you yell at me when it doesn't make you feel different than you already do, especially since you won't tell me how you already feel."

She considered this. "I'm sorry I'm such a bitch."

"You aren't, not right now at least," Grantaire said with a smile. "I imagine your body feels like mine would if I tried to stop drinking."

"It's awful."

"You see, I'm quite trapped. If I stop drinking, it hurts. If I keep drinking, it keeps the hurt away for a little while," he explained. He laid down beside her, stretching out on his back.

"There are other ways to be trapped," Eponine said sadly. "I'm really sorry I can't tell you what my deal is," she looked up at him. "But I can tell you that even though I just kind of freaked out on you, you're helping. You make me feel like a real person again."

With this, Grantaire realized the effect Eponine had on him. She could bring him up and throw him back down again with five words if she wanted to, and it scared the hell out of him. He suspected that she knew it, and she confirmed it by bringing one of her soft hands to his cheek. "I want this, Grantaire. I want you with me, just like this."

_Sunshine, I'm beginning to like this  
Cause all I want to be is the minute that you hold me in  
When you pretend that I'm all that you waited for  
Time slips to nothing and I'm better than I've ever been; I'm suspended_

Something in his heart ached. She moved her hand to his shoulder, and gently wrapped herself around him. They lay in the quiet like that for a while, falling asleep to the soft sound of each other breathing.

The next day, Monday, Grantaire couldn't suppress the yawns that fought their way out of his mouth every few minutes. He was exhausted. After Eponine felt a little better, they worked on the studying and homework they had neglected all weekend in the living room until late into the night with Jehan. He didn't ask; he just wanted his friends to be happy. He saw Grantaire start to shake a little bit as the afternoon turned into the evening, clenching his teeth with a headache. Jehan recognized these as symptoms Grantaire encountered when he hadn't drank in a bit. If Eponine was the cause of this sobriety, Jehan sure as hell wasn't going to say anything to ruin it.

Marius noticed the yawns as he, Grantaire, Joly, Bossuet and Courfeyrac sat together around a table for lunch. They all had a break in the same building on campus on Mondays for lunch, and naturally gathered together. Marius, and everyone else, had heard about Eponine and Grantaire in varying degrees at this point, and there was an awkward air about the table. "Long weekend, R?" he asked innocently.

"You could say that," Grantaire replied quietly. He still didn't know if Eponine was over Marius, but he had more pride than to think he needed Marius' permission to have a crush on his ex-girlfriend.

_It's not enough to stay surrounded  
It's not enough to stay awake, torn, braced, cornered  
And not feel alive_

Courfeyrac, whose mischievous side nearly always got the best of him, felt a kick underneath the table from Grantaire, as a warning not to say too much. Grantaire's heart started to race. He wondered where Eponine was, realizing that he didn't even know her class schedule outside of the few she had with him. Joly and Bossuet glanced sideways at each other, fighting to suppress grins.

They ate without incident for a few minutes, everyone but Marius and Grantaire rushing to fill any silence. After a little, they ran out of things to talk about as everyone tried desperately to avoid the topic of the past weekend. "Jehan finally showed Grantaire that picture of him and Enjolras making out," Courfeyrac shared nonchalantly. Everyone burst into laughter except Grantaire, who blushed furiously.

"Thanks for sharing, Courf. Glad I can count on you," Grantaire said with a glare.

"Oh, lighten up, it's about time you knew," Bossuet said with an apologetic smile. "Although, I do want to see how long we can keep the truth from Enjolras. I honestly think we could keep that from him forever, the way he fails to pay attention to gossip."

Joly snickered. "Unless, Grantaire, you want to go at it again. You seemed pretty into it. Bossuet and I would love to double date with you guys." Bossuet nodded. Clearly, this topic had come up before without Grantaire's knowledge.

Grantaire swore something rather colorful under his breath before finally stammering, "For fuck's sake, I didn't even know that happened. I do not now and have not ever wanted to, like, be with Enjolras. I'm just jealous he has his shit together, okay?"

"Besides, you're fucking Eponine anyway, right?" Marius interrupted. And just like that, it was out there in the open.

Grantaire froze like a deer in headlights.

"What would it matter to you if he was, anyway?" Courfeyrac asked Marius.

Marius didn't take his eyes away from Grantaire. "It wouldn't matter to me. I would just warn you, or anyone else, that she's…trouble. I don't think you want to be her rebound."

Grantaire narrowed his eyes. Marius never spoke about their breakup, but Grantaire didn't like where this conversation was going. He could tell, with a glance around the table, that nobody else did either. To their knowledge, Eponine had never done anything except take the breakup hard.

Courfeyrac and Marius had been roommates freshman year, and even he was surprised at the negativity coming from Marius. "She's our friend, Marius, stop talking shit," he said. Grantaire had half a mind to stick his tongue out at Marius as they stood to get ready for their next classes.

As he and Jehan walked home together later, Grantaire asked his friend if he had heard about the lunchtime spat. "Yes," Jehan admitted. "But I wouldn't let Marius get in the way of what you want. He has Cosette, and I think everyone agrees that he was out of line, saying that to you."

"Thanks for telling me," Grantaire breathed with a sigh of relief. He wasn't sure what was going on, but it didn't matter. Eponine came over nearly every night that week. Sometimes they drank, sometimes they didn't. He almost succeeded in drinking only when she wanted to, and whatever was happening, he liked it. He liked having her around.

_Sunshine, I'm beginning to like this  
Sunshine, I'm beginning to like it  
I'm suspended_

Song is Suspended by Matt Nathanson

xoxo


	6. Crazy Beautiful Life

So this chapter is just fun. Silly fun with a little smut. I really hope everyone likes my characters…I just wanted to try something different and I'm hoping it's turning out well; please let me know. Also, sorry I'm not sorry for using a Ke$ha song here. It just fits.

_I'm in love, alright, with my crazy, beautiful life  
With the parties, the disasters, with my friends all pretty & plastered_

Eponine ran her straightener through her hair for the umpteenth time at her friend Azelma's apartment. The two could have passed for sisters. They were fast friends from the day they started school, becoming inseparable since their freshman orientation weekend. Eponine estimated they actually made to maybe a quarter of the events they were supposed to attend. Since then they stayed close.

Azelma, clad in black jeans, heels and a pink tank top, squeezed beside Eponine to start her makeup in the mirror. She held a shot in Eponine's face, forcing her to hold it. "What are we toasting to?" Eponine said, setting down the straightener.

"To your new man," Azelma leered.

"Stop calling him that," Eponine demanded, but tossed back the shot anyway. Cherry flavored rum. "He is not my man."

"That's not what Bahorel says." Azelma was a physical therapy major along with Bahorel, but she didn't always hang out with Eponine's friends. She was in a sorority and it took up a lot of her time and energy. In fact, she and Eponine were pregaming for a party at a fraternity house on campus to which Bahorel was a member.

"Fine. Your boyfriend, then?"

"Grantaire is not my boyfriend. He's not my anything."

"He's obviously your something," Azelma pressed.

"Well, last time I had a _something_, it didn't work out so well, did it?" Eponine said darkly. She had on a black skirt and a white top with black tall boots.

"Is Grantaire your first since-"

"Yes," Eponine cut Azelma off. "And no, he doesn't know."

Eponine poured another shot out. "To…friends with benefits?" asked Azelma.

The other girl smirked. "Maybe. That seems messy, though. Don't they make rom-coms making fun of that now? I don't want him to fall in love with me."

"How do you know you wouldn't be the one to fall in love with him?" Azelma asked, before she raised her shot glass to clink a toast. Eponine nearly choked on her alcohol. "And you can't use Marius as an excuse anymore. I don't fucking allow you to think like that," Azelma warned.

Eponine pretended to ignore her and retrieved her phone from where she had it charging. She scrolled through her texts. "Bahorel says he added Grantaire and that whole group to the invite list at the house tonight," she informed Azelma.

_Every night we're down to go out, waking up on a different couch  
'Til the next night on the next flight, yeah I guess we're doing alright_

Twenty minutes later the girls stumbled out of Azelma's apartment in the direction of the fraternity, toting water bottles containing half lemonade, half cherry rum. Eponine shivered in the cold March air, glad she had remembered to bring her jacket from her parents' house this weekend.

"Do you think you'll be coming back to my place after?" Azelma asked, her teeth chattering.

Eponine shrugged. "Who knows."

"Good, cause I'm kind of not planning on going back to my place either," Azelma smirked.

Before long they arrived on the porch of the enormous house. The fraternity had at least sixty brothers, twenty of whom lived in the house. It was more like a mansion than anything. Eponine texted him, asking him to let her and Azelma in the house. She didn't know how Bahorel could live here, but it fit his boisterous personality, she supposed.

"Heeeeeyy!" he greeted them as he swung open the door. Eponine groaned a little at how overly crowded the house seemed to be, but she knew she shouldn't have expected anything less. There wasn't really a whole lot else to do on the weekends on campus, and her group had mostly been going to bars recently. It'd been a while, and Bahorel begged them to come to his fraternity's party.

"So, who else is here?" she asked as she and Azelma handed him their coats. One of the perks of being friends with a house brother was that their stuff was always safe in his room.

"Grantaire's at a pong table downstairs," he answered sarcastically. He dashed up the stairs before Eponine could fire a retort at him. Eponine started to make an indignant noise, when Azelma just laughed and prodded her in the direction of the stairs.

"Come on, we might as well go down there and dance if there aren't any tables open. Clearly I'm going to have to finish this drink faster than I was planning," Azelma said, her water bottle in hand.

Eponine nodded, and the two would their way through the crowd down to the basement. The basement was like a huge cavern, made up of at least 5 big, connected rooms. There was a bar in one room, where everyone kept their beer, and a sound equipment in another. The rooms were littered with (filthy) couches, tables where students were playing drinking games, and lots of drunk people.

_We're falling in love, til the sun's coming up, just living the life  
Every single night we fight to get a little high on life  
To get a little something right, something real, at least we try_

Azelma spotted the group first, dragging Eponine in the direction of a pong table. Eponine saw Enjolras' shock of blonde hair first. He and Grantaire were on a team, playing against Feuilly and Combeferre. Even though he drank the least, Enjolras was by far the best at most drinking games, simply because he couldn't stand to lose anything. It looked like he and Grantaire were kicking ass, as they only had two cups left, while Feuilly and Combeferre still had seven up.

The girls stood, watching and sipping their drinks, until Enjolras and Grantaire easily beat the other two. They high-fived, and Grantaire looked around laughing. He noticed Marius staring awkwardly at someone, and he followed his gaze to Eponine.

"Hey, Marius, take over for me?" he called. Marius snapped out of his trance, and nodded. He joined Enjolras' side at the table to take on the next round of competitors.

Azelma squeezed Eponine's shoulder and left, presumably to find someone to dance with, just before Grantaire reached them. Eponine made a mental note to kick her for that later. "Hey," she said, taking a drink from her bottle.

"Hey," Grantaire said sheepishly back to her. This was the first time they had been together in public in the week since they'd started…this. _God, could it really only have been a week_, Eponine wondered.

"So you're on good terms with Enjolras?" Eponine asked. She winced, cursing herself for bringing up such a sensitive topic first thing. To her surprise, Grantaire laughed.

"Yeah, I made Jehan show him while we were pregaming. He took it better than I thought he would."

"Clearly," Eponine grinned back. "So are you guys really that good or does Combeferre let you win so that Enjolras doesn't throw a fit?"

"No way!" Grantaire insisted. "We're actually that good. I made six of our cups, for your information. What are you drinking?"

Eponine thrust the open bottle toward him, "Here, try it. Cherry rum and lemonade. It's too sweet, Azelma made it." Grantaire was drinking a cup of beer himself, no doubt from a keg.

He took a swig and coughed a little. "That's like drinking pure sugar. I'll get you beer if you want."

"Thanks," Eponine said honestly. "Maybe in a little."

_Every single night we fight, to get a little high on life  
To get a little something right, something real, at least we try_

The night passed in a blur. Five minutes passed the same as an hour of dancing, drinking, music, laughing at freshmen and stealing kisses in dark corners. Eponine followed Grantaire, or maybe it was the other way around—nobody could tell—all night. At some point, Azelma dragged Eponine to the dance floor to talk away from everyone else.

"Wait, when did I get this?" Eponine raised her cup of beer to Azelma.

Azelma just laughed, "I don't know. We've been here for like two hours. I finished mine a while ago so…I don't know."

"I don't either," Eponine giggled back. Clearly, they were drunk. "God, I miss doing this! When did we get too cool for this?"

"When we all turned 21 and could stop bumming beer off of frat guys," Azelma shouted back. It was really getting loud and rowdy in the basement.

Bahorel approached them, putting an arm around each of their shoulders. "Ladies, you're invited to join my flip cup team."

"Only if you refill our cups first!" declared Eponine.

"Deal," he grinned. Bahorel took their cups and went to fill them, so they joined the rest of their friends at the tables where it looked like a pretty epic game of flip cup was being set up. There were three pong tables pushed together in one room, at least twenty people were lined up to play. Grantaire slipped into a spot beside Eponine, and they snickered as Courfeyrac yelled at everyone to be quiet so he could explain the rules.

"Alright, fuckers, listen up. In case you've somehow made it this far into your college education without learning how to play, we're splitting down the middle into two teams. The first two players on each team will raise their cups, chant, drink, then start flipping. When they flip their cup up onto the table, the next person can start. I'm not explaining past that," he said bossily. "We're going to start with—" he looked dramatically around the room, "—Eponine and Grantaire!" Courfeyrac shot them his most charming smile possible. "Ready when you are!"

_We're falling in love, til the sun's coming up, just living the life  
Every single night we fight to get a little high on life  
To get a little something right, something real, at least we try_

They grinned at each other, forgetting everyone else in the room. They poured beer from their cups into their empty ones, then raised them to each other, before shouting in unison, "I declare a boat race, I declare a boat race, ay di ay di ay di AYY ay di ay di ay di AYY!" They clinked cups, set them down, picked them up and chugged. Grantaire finished a second before Eponine, but he fumbled his first flip. And his second flip. By his third attempt, Eponine had finished her beer, and their cups landed perfectly on the table almost in unison.

Grantaire didn't care where they were or what they were doing. He put his hands on Eponine's waist and pulled her to him, kissing her. She opened her mouth for him, and mimicked his enthusiasm. They couldn't hear the catcalls and jokes being shouted at them. Eponine reached up a hand to gently thread them through his black curls, and he lost it. He pulled her through the basement, neither of them bothering to conceal the lust on their faces.

The house was so full of people that nobody said anything as they ran up the basement stairs and through the main floor. "Too many people here," Eponine said, before dragging Grantaire up a winding grand staircase to the next floor.

"These are all bedrooms, we can't…hook up in someone's room!" Grantaire exclaimed. Eponine pushed him against a wall in response, kissing him, grabbing his dick through his jeans.

"Upstairs," she said through a kiss.

"No no no no no," he tried to protest. "They'd kill us."

"They won't know," Eponine said again, grinding forcefully against him. She slipped her tongue into that space between his lip and his teeth, and Grantaire shuddered with pleasure. "That's what I thought," she said boldly. He followed her up a small, almost hidden set of stairs.

_Every single night we fight, to get a little high on life  
To get a little something right, something real, at least we try_

Eponine led him into what the house considered their chapter room. It was where they met once a week to go over fraternity business. The room was sacred to them, holding ritual materials and more history than any of them even knew. And this pair was about to desecrate it. They ran to the front of the room, accidentally bumping into the rows of chairs and tripping over the throw rug.

There was a big, old crushed velvet sofa in the front corner of the room. Grantaire didn't know what it was there for, he just knew he wanted Eponine on it.

"See, this is hot," she said in between kisses. She moved her hands to work at undoing his jeans, purposely grazing his dick with her hand a few times in the process.

Grantaire pushed her top down, exposing her breasts. She inhaled sharply as her nipples hardened in the cool attic air. She pushed his pants down to his ankles, and he pulled her up so that he could caress her nipples with his tongue.

"Yeah, this is pretty hot," he agreed. He was really drunk, or he would have felt stupid at not coming up with anything wittier to say.

Grantaire slid his hands underneath Eponine's skirt, pushing it up so that it bunched with her skirt. She kissed him hungrily for a few more minutes, but it was hard for her to contain what she had been feeling all night. She placed one of his hands on her panties, begging him with her eyes for him to take them off. So he did.

Eponine fished a condom out of his pocket, where she knew she could find it, and put it on him. She lowered herself onto him, and moaned with pleasure at the feeling she had come to crave. "Has it really only been a week?" she asked, as she started to rock her hips. She dug her nails into Grantaire's shoulders.

"Mhmm," was the only answer he could give. Eponine rocked faster, not even caring how loud she was being. The couch creaked a little beneath them. She groaned as Grantaire sunk his mouth into her shoulder, at the sensitive spot above her collarbone.

And they continued, at that point of being drunk where sex stops being regular sex and reaches porn star status, but before being too drunk to function. They continued for a little until they heard Grantaire's phone ring with an incoming text message, no doubt from one of their friends looking for them. Grantaire took this as his cue to meet Eponine's thrusts with his own, until the pressure inside him reached its white hot point and he came. He moved a hand to Eponine, his thumb circling her clit until her body wracked against his with pleasure. He shuddered as her still-exposed nipples grazed him through his shirt.

"We're idiots," Grantaire giggled as Eponine rearranged her clothes, and he put his jeans back in place.

"I don't even care, do you?" she laughed back.

"No," he said, a little more seriously. "I like this."

"Me, too," Eponine said. "How long do you think we can do this before one of us messes it up though?"

"I'm willing to take that chance," Grantaire said.

She kissed him back in agreement, and nobody thought anything of it when the two of them stumbled back onto the main floor. They passed Bahorel and Azelma as they descended the staircase.

"I'm not coming home, Eponine," Azelma said mischievously, grinning at Bahorel.

"Not a problem," Eponine countered. Bahorel ran up the stairs and threw Eponine's jacket back down at her. Grantaire helped her into it, and they drunkenly half-walked, half-ran back to his apartment.

"I cannot believe we just did that," Eponine gasped.

"I cannot believe we lasted that long into the night," Grantaire remarked. "You're too sexy."

"_You're _too sexy," Eponine retorted. "With your stupid hair and your stupid smile and showing me up at drinking games all the time."

Without warning, she tackled Grantaire right off the sidewalk, into somebody's front yard. "Ponine, stop, we've gotta get back to my place!"

She kissed him. That night, Eponine kissed Grantaire probably a hundred more times. Her sadness lifted a little, and it became slightly more bearable for him to be sober.

_Time after time, try dodging all the douchebag guys  
Try trading all the wasted times for something real in this crazy life_

Song is Crazy, Beautiful Life by KeSha. Chapter is a pretty accurate look at American college fraternity/sorority life based on four years of personal experience. Gawwwd I miss this. I just randomly heard this song and really thought it reflected how Eponine and Grantaire feel about each other. Not sure if it's a relationship or a real no-strings-attached thing and not caring to make the distinction because while they can't label it, it makes them happy at the moment, and that's all they need. Xoxo.


	7. Paradise

Lovely readers, so sorry about the time since my last chapter! I got a job offer and had to pick up and move my entire life in less than a week. Things are finally getting settled so expect regular updates again.

Extra special thanks to ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo for being the best beta I could ask for. And more thanks for the reviews, I respond when I can and I welcome any suggestions/criticisms or whatever! We find out what Eponine's secret is in this chapter...so here we go!

_When she was just a girl, she expected the world  
But it flew away from her reach, so she ran away in her sleep  
Dreamed of paradise, every time she closed her eyes_

The Monday after the night at the frat house, the usual group of friends met for dinner at their favorite restaurant, Café Musain. Grantaire and Eponine sat across from each other, playing footsie like a couple of kids. When Bahorel walked in the room, he casually dropped Eponine's discarded panties in her lap, a clear act to make sure they knew how much they owed him (and Azelma) for taking the fall for that. "You really need to keep better track of your undies, Eponine," Grantaire chided as she blushed.

Over the next couple of weeks, Eponine and Grantaire settled into an easy routine. He tried not to drink, and when the urge was too overpowering, a quick text to Eponine would bring her and her comforting kisses to him. When her family was too much to handle, she called Grantaire under the pretense of anything else and he automatically invited her to his apartment.

On the way home from a typical Thursday night of drinking at the Corinth, Eponine intertwined her fingers with Grantaire's. Jehan walked with them, not feeling at all like a third wheel. He kind of liked seeing them together, and although he would never show them, their budding not-romance (they insisted) even inspired a few of his last writing pieces.

The trio arrived at the apartment, and Jehan pushed past the other two, who had started making out against the building, to unlock the door. Where this behavior surely would have earned a stern retribution from some of their other friends, Jehan just shook his head. Who was he to stop his new favorite source of inspiration? They followed him, tripping over each other, up the stairs. Jehan found himself abandoned when he reached the door, and decided it was against his better judgment to double back to look for his friends. Sure enough, they stumbled into the apartment twenty minutes later, just as he'd started to watch a movie.

It wasn't too late, and Grantaire collapsed into his favorite spot on the sofa while Eponine put a bag of popcorn to pop in the microwave. She leaned against the counter, humming to herself.

"Eponine," Jehan called.

"Yeah?"

"You remember how we played 'I Never' the other week?"

"Mhmm," she nodded.

Grantaire laughed, "How could we forget?"

"True," Jehan acknowledged with a grin. "While you guys were…gone…just now, I was wondering what your tattoo was. I still haven't seen it. Or yours, for that matter," he said as he turned to nod at Grantaire.

"Oh," Eponine faltered. Grantaire had of course seen it since, but he didn't know her explanation had been a lie. She lifted up the right side of her shirt, and an elaborate but pristine pink ribbon in the shape of a bow adorned her side, over her ribcage.

"That's beautiful, Eponine," Jehan said in earnest. "Why did you get it?"

The microwave timer buzzed, startling Eponine. She dropped her shirt. "I just liked it, I guess. I got it after Marius and I broke up. I wanted there to be a part of me that he didn't know about," she said carefully. She shrugged and dumped the popcorn into a big bowl so they could share and joined her friends in the living room.

Grantaire's mouth had formed a tight line at the mention of Eponine's ex-boyfriend. Things had been a little weird since the frat party, and Grantaire could not figure out why Marius was being so awkward about it. He and Marius hadn't been the closest of friends, so Grantaire didn't get why he wasn't allowed to be friends with benefits (his and Eponine's unspoken agreement) with a girl Marius had long since replaced.

"What about you, R?" Eponine asked incredulously. The thought honestly hadn't occurred to her since the first time the subject was brought up. "How the hell have I not seen yours yet?"

"Seriously, how is that even possible?" Jehan also questioned.

"I don't make a point of showing it to people, I don't think I like it anymore," Grantaire said. He cracked a beer can open and drank so that he didn't have to explain further.

"But still, how on earth is there an inch of you this girl hasn't seen?"

"You're being awfully forward," Eponine laughed. She opened a beer for herself and passed one to Jehan.

"What? The walls aren't exactly soundproof." Jehan kicked off his shoes and crossed his legs under him.

"That's a good point," Eponine nodded.

"Before this gets any more awkward, fine," Grantaire said, slurring the tiniest bit. He took his watch, which had a thick leather band, and held his wrist out. There were two lines of text, wrapped almost like a bracelet around his wrist. The words were tiny, almost impossibly so for a tattoo.

"Je n'ai pas peur, je suis né pour ce faire," Jehan read with an slight French accent. "I took French in high school," he said to answer the glances the other two gave him. "I don't remember enough to know what that means, though."

"It's a quote by Joan of Arc. It means 'I am not afraid, I was born to do this,'" Grantaire explained. "I told you, Ponine, I let my friends in high school talk me into a lot of stupid things."

He picked up his beer as a reminder after hastily putting his watch back on.

"I don't think it's stupid," Eponine said truthfully. "I think it's kinda cool."

"I didn't realize how damn girly it was at the time. I don't even remember what drugs I was taking at the time, obviously something weird."

Jehan snorted, "Come on, I've seen worse. At least it's a decent quote."

"I haven't decided what it means to me yet," Grantaire said.

The three friends sat up late into the night, talking in a philosophical way rarely achieved by the sober.

Eponine woke up the next morning, groaning as her phone rang. One of her arms was stuck impossibly underneath Grantaire, who had a leg wrapped around her. It didn't look light enough outside the window to have to get up for class, but the phone started to ring again after she let it go to voicemail the first time. There was no way for Eponine to move without waking Grantaire, but she figured if she didn't wake him her phone would anyway.

Grantaire grumbled as Eponine untangled herself from him to retrieve her phone from where it had fallen on the floor. As she suspected, her too-bright phone screen informed her that it was just after seven in the morning. Eponine briefly cursed the picture that popped up on the screen for robbing her of at least another hour of sleep before class. It was Cosette.

_When she was just a girl, she expected the world  
But it flew away from her reach and the bullets catch in her teeth  
Life goes on, it gets so heavy, the wheel breaks the butterfly  
Every tear, a waterfall_

"Hello?" she said, ending the question with a yawn.

"Hey, can you meet me for lunch or something after your class?"

Eponine frowned. She and Cosette might have hung out with the same group of people, but she never considered them friends. Eponine felt that Marius had thrown her aside and replaced her with Cosette before she even had a chance to try to redeem herself or fix the relationship she had ruined. "Why?" she asked simply. She wasn't in the mood for small talk.

Eponine could picture Cosette squirming on the other end of the line. Cosette was, as a matter of fact, rubbing her tear-swollen eyes and trying to maintain a steady voice. "It's really important, I promise. I need to talk to you. I know we aren't really friends or anything-" Eponine couldn't stop herself from snorting "-but I swear this is important."

"If you want me to apologize for being a shithead when you were my parents' foster child, I believe I already have. Several times. We were kids," Eponine said, trying to repent for the only offense she could call to mind that she'd ever committed against Cosette.

Cosette surprised her by replying with a bitter laugh. "It's not that at all. Please, Eponine. It's about Marius."

Eponine's heart stopped. _No, no, no, no, no,_ her brain screamed at her on repeat. She was finally starting to be happy again. For a split second, she wondered if Marius had a sixth sense that allowed him to sense when she was happy so that he could valiantly put a stop to it for her own good, as he would have put it. "Yes. Fine. If it's that important, I'm not going to fucking class. When can you meet me?"

"Can you come to my house? Marius isn't here. I just got here, actually. My dad's still asleep, nobody will bother us."

"Fine," Eponine agreed. "I'm bringing coffee. I'll be there as soon as I can." She ended the call without another word.

"What happened?" Grantaire asked sleepily. Eponine was dashing around his room, throwing on the first clean clothes she found. A pair of Grantaire's sweatpants and a long sleeved t-shirt. She harshly yanked her hair into a ponytail as she spoke.

"Cosette needs to talk to me. Sounded like an emergency."

"It must be an emergency if Pontmercy allows her to talk to you," he joked.

Eponine didn't smile back. "I mean a real emergency, R." His face fell, and Eponine kissed him quickly before leaving. "If I'm not back before class, don't wait for me, but go so I can have your notes?"

"Of course," Grantaire agreed. His heart fluttered nervously in his chest. He was wide awake now. Eponine ran out of his room and out of the apartment, letting the front door slam loudly behind her.

Jehan appeared in Grantaire's doorway a few moments later. "Do you not believe in privacy, Jehan?" Grantaire asked, only half-kidding. "I appreciate that you care enough to act like my personal day planner, but-" he cut himself off as Jehan's face fell. "Never mind, what's up?"

Jehan looked anywhere but Grantaire's eyes. "Did you tell Eponine yet? That you love her?"

Grantaire didn't quite know how to react. "No. Should I have?"

Jehan entered the room and sat at the foot of the bed. "Are you fucking kidding me? Of course you should! If you wait for her to say it first, we'll all be old and gray by the time that happens."

Grantaire's heart ached. "It just never seems like the right time to say it. Especially since she just stormed out of here to talk to Cosette. About Marius. I need a fucking drink," he muttered. He rose and walked briskly from the room, Jehan in close pursuit.

"You don't know what they're talking about! Hopefully Cosette's apologizing for what a doucher Marius has been toward you recently."

"So I'm not being paranoid then? You've noticed it too?" Grantaire asked as he retrieved a bottle of Mad Dog from the fridge.

Jehan rolled his eyes. "Nice breakfast."

"It's the breakfast of champions, I've heard," Grantaire said with a straight face.

"Anyway, yeah. I've never seen you this happy before and Eponine's certainly doing better than she was last semester. Before you."

Grantaire thought of how Jehan probably wanted to finish the sentence. _Before you, after Marius._

"Just think about it, okay?" Jehan said. "You two are kind of…inspiring together."

"Whatever, I'll think about it," dismissed Grantaire. He was laughing on the inside, imagining Jehan writing sonnets about the two broken nymphomaniac alcoholics.

Eponine arrived, breathless, at Cosette's imposing brick house. It was a few metro stops away from anywhere Eponine was used to, and it took her a few minutes to locate a Starbucks within a decent distance. She balanced the coffee in one hand and texted Cosette with the other.

"Hey, thanks for not knocking," Cosette said when she answered the door. "Wouldn't want to wake my dad up for this one," she added.

"Yeah," was all Eponine could say in response. She felt like she was going to be sick the entire journey there and her dread was growing worse by the minute. Cosette motioned her inside, and Eponine followed her down a set of stairs into a nicely finished basement.

"Eponine, I'm so sorry. I've been up all night."

"Crying?" Eponine handed the blonde a steaming cup of coffee, praying the girl wouldn't spill it with her shaking hands.

"Yeah," she admitted. "Thanks for the coffee, though."

Eponine wanted to get this over with as painlessly as possible. "Why did you need to speak to me so badly that you called me at seven on a Friday morning after you know I was out drinking last night?" Her head throbbed along with her heart. She felt almost bad for using a harsh tone when she realized that Cosette looked sincerely upset.  
_  
In the night, the stormy night, she closed her eyes  
In the night, the stormy night, away she'd fly_

"I never understood what Marius had against you. I love him, but I've known you a lot longer than I've known him." Eponine scowled, and Cosette took a breath before continuing. "I know you're not a bad person. I know your parents are awful. I just couldn't understand why Marius was so fixated on you…dating…Grantaire." Eponine didn't say anything, and just picked at the lid of her coffee cup with a fingernail. Cosette was desperate for Eponine to say something to point her in the next direction, but Eponine remained silent. "Well, he told me that he accidentally got you pregnant last semester."

The world spun around Eponine, then crashed out from under her. "Why would he tell you that?" Eponine asked in a choked out whisper. "That's not what FUCKING happened," she said with as much emphasis as she could manage despite the complete lack of her ability to breathe.

"I know, I know, Eponine," Cosette said as quickly as she could. She was still wearing her jeans and sweater from the night before, Eponine noted. Her clothes smelled faintly like cigarette smoke from the bar. Cosette scooted closer to her on the couch they were sharing.

Eponine had gone rigid, her face blank. Cosette set her own cup of coffee down and gently pried Eponine's from her hands, then took the brunette's hands in her own. "Marius is mad at you because he thinks you killed your…baby." It was hard for her to get the words out. "He can't understand why you would do such a cruel thing. Not that he was necessarily ready to be a father. He said he wishes you gave it up for adoption, anything really other than an abortion. He's really upset about it, Eponine."

Eponine was silent for a moment. Her mind reeled as she tried to string together a sentence. "You've got to be kidding me," she said, her words abbreviated with a choke. She looked wildly around the room until she spotted a bathroom, and ran before she got sick on the couch.

_Dreamed of para-para-paradise  
Dreamed of para-para-paradise  
So lying underneath those stormy skies  
She said, "I know the sun must set to rise"_

Cosette, a nursing student, followed her cautiously. "Eponine, he hasn't told anyone but me, I'm sure of it." Eponine ignored her and rinsed her mouth out in the sink. "I know he's wrong. But he's not lying."

Eponine gagged on her mouthful of water. "How can you fucking stick up for him?" she screeched. She stood and pushed Cosette before she could stop herself. "His aunt told me he WANTED me to get it. That it was the only way to save our relationship."

Cosette backed slowly away from Eponine. "Marius and I went to his aunt's place last night. It's why we left the bar so early. His cousins are in town and wanted to see him."

"And?"

"And I asked to use his aunt's computer to check on something for school." Eponine felt another wave of nausea wash over her. Cosette continued gently, "She left her e-mail up…and I couldn't not read it when I saw your name. Long story short, Marius hates you for having an abortion. He told me that you guys hadn't reached a decision and you had one without asking him first. But it's pretty clear from the e-mails I read that his aunt manipulated you both."

"She didn't want the damn precious Pontmercy name dirtied with another Thenardier brat," Eponine murmured. "Marius wouldn't even talk to me about it after I told him what I had done. I didn't understand why he was so mad, his aunt told me it was what he wanted."

Cosette dragged her back to the couch. "I've been up all night trying to make sense of this. Marius says he broke up with you because you went behind his back. He said I must have read the e-mails wrong. But I know you better than that, Ponine. What happened?"

Eponine sniffled and started to hiccup between words. "His aunt practically forced me into it. She made me feel worse about myself than even my parents ever have. Took me out one day and marched me right up to a clinic, shoved a blank check in my face to cover the cost. I guess Marius went to her for advice once I told him I was pregnant. She told me Marius was embarrassed about the situation. That I would only ruin his life by having our daughter. I believed her."

Eponine barely got the words out in between the tears she was now crying into Cosette's shoulder.__

This could be para-para-paradise  
This could be para-para-paradise

Please let me know if you like this! I really like writing these characters the more we get to know how sassy and fun the actors from the movie are…like writing Jehan is way more fun now that I read Brammer's Twitter and that we see more and more of the actors' bromance they developed on set.

I hope Eponine and Cosette's past came across alright in this one! This song is Paradise by Coldplay. I don't even really like Coldplay but I heard this song a while back and it just fits here so well between those two.


	8. My Favorite Accident

_I got the message long before you said you knew there was no chance of us at all  
With no velocity and empty-headed, hardened for too long, I spent two years alone with you  
Just when I thought I had forgotten, you came back soft without a sound_

After Cosette had sufficiently calmed her down that afternoon, Eponine decided to walk home alone. Cosette hugged her, promising to be there whenever Eponine needed her. The brunette thanked her profusely, truly grateful for their serendipitous friendship.

Eponine kept to the sidewalk, tripping on the uneven pavement every so often. The sleeves of her army green hoodie were damp and smeared with her makeup from wiping her eyes. She couldn't believe, of all people, Cosette had been the one to find out what she did…and forgive her for it. She was lost in her thoughts, and jumped when someone grabbed her shoulder. She turned quickly to face the perpetrator, drawing her hands into fists that she raised defensively in front of her chest.

"Are you okay? Eponine, what's wrong?" It was Combeferre. One of Marius' friends, similar in ferocity to Enjolras, but calmer somehow. She always found him to be easy to talk to, and if he ever judged her, he didn't show it.

"Oh, fuck, I'm sorry," Eponine apologized. She dropped her hands back to her sides. "I wasn't really paying attention, 'Ferre. You scared me."

"No shit," he replied hastily. "Not to sound creepy, but I followed you, calling your name out my car for a block." He gestured to his car, parked a little ways behind them. "I ran to catch up with you. You don't look well." Combeferre returned his comforting hand to Eponine's shoulder and steered her back in the direction of his car.

If Eponine had an ounce of energy left in her body, she would have blushed. "Gee, thanks."

"Well, I didn't mean it like that," Combeferre mumbled.

"It's alright," she said with a small smile. "It's been a rough day so far." She didn't protest as he opened his passenger door and motioned for her to sit.

"Anything you feel like talking about?" Combeferre asked as he turned the car back on.

Eponine paused, and sighed. "Well. You're not on anybody's side, right?"

Combeferre smiled. "No, 'Ponine, I'm not. I don't see any reason why I can't be friends with all three of you." It was painfully obvious who he meant.

She bit her lip. "I don't know if you'd think that if you knew the whole story." In the past few hours, all of Eponine's worst fears had come true. She couldn't tell what she hated herself for the most. Despite Cosette's attempts to paint the situation as a painful misunderstanding, Eponine couldn't get past the feelings of shame and regret she had.

"I don't need to know the whole story, Eponine," Combeferre said kindly. He was one of the most sincere people Eponine had ever met. She figured he was as neutral of a friend as she was going to get. She didn't say anything as she noticed Combeferre turn his car down Grantaire's street, although she should have assumed this was where anyone would take her.

"Well, I found out why Marius broke up with me. It isn't what I thought."

"Is it a better or a worse reason?"

"That's impossible to answer. It's such a mess I don't even know how to explain," she said numbly.

_You said we were an accident, with accidents you'll never know what could have been  
So we were an accident…you'll always be my favorite one_

Combeferre parked his car in front of the familiar building. "Can you at least tell me where you were walking from when I picked you up?"

"Cosette's house. I was there since this morning."

"Oh," Combeferre said. "This does sound complicated."

Eponine just nodded. "It's pretty fucked up."

She couldn't decide if she hated or loved Combeferre for the look of absolute pity he was giving her. "Well, did Cosette at least help you narrow down what to do?"

"Yeah, she did." _I can stay with Grantaire and never tell him, I can tell Grantaire what a stupid dirty slut I am, or-_ and she could barely let this thought cross her mind- _I could try to talk to Marius_. That one had actually been Cosette's idea. Somehow, the blonde was more loyal than Eponine would have ever imagined, and promised that she wouldn't tell Marius anything without Eponine's permission.

_You hit the road and left me an ocean, I can't swim in the silence of your skin  
Please let me inside the times we never had right  
Inside two years alone with you_

Eponine wasn't sure how Cosette could stay with Marius after these recent revelations, but every time she dared to think this, a nasty little voice in her head asked why she _wanted _to go back to the man who abandoned her. But would it be different if he knew the truth? Eponine's head was spinning with the choices she had to make, and fast. She wasn't even sure if Grantaire's place was where she was walking when she left Cosette's, but here she was.

"Good. I told R you were here; he should be coming down to get you," Combeferre said, squeezing Eponine into an awkward hug in the cramped space. "Let me know if you need anything."

"Thanks," she sighed into his shoulder. She walked hastily into the foyer of the building and waited for Grantaire to retrieve her.

Earlier that day, Grantaire returned to his apartment after classes with Feuilly. They had an art class together, and it had been Feuilly who'd suggested getting baked before tackling the project. Thanks to Enjolras and their other friends, the task of designing a sign for a mock-political rally of their choosing would be almost too easy.

The guys were spread out all over the living room, newspaper covering the floor. They each had a large poster board on the floor in front of them, paint markers scattered between them. The windows were open and the warming spring air wafted through the apartment, taking the smell of weed and paint back outside.

"We probably could have just asked Enjolras for two old rally signs and turned those in for a grade," Feuilly smirked as he passed the blunt he'd brought to Grantaire, who inhaled deeply.

"But," he said, "then we couldn't be doing this." He passed it back to the redhead.

"True," Feuilly laughed. He held the blunt in one hand and he absentmindedly twirled a black paint marker in the other. "Maybe we could give these to Enjolras as presents next time we piss him off?"

"I was gonna give mine to Eponine," Grantaire said.

"Wow, you really are head over heels. Giving a girl an art project…Didn't get that out of your system when you were ten? I definitely gave a girl an origami swan once, and I was definitely in elementary school."

"Bastard. You didn't even ask me what cause my sign was supporting." One of Grantaire's hands held the board down, as his other hand drew paint across the sign. Feuilly cocked his head to the side to get a better look at the slogan.

"Since when have you paid attention to the foster care system?"

"I don't know much, actually. Eponine's parents used to be a foster family, and they had Cosette for a little while when she was a kid. I forgot until I heard Eponine say something about it to Cosette this morning."

"Oh," Feuilly said. "I didn't know that. What's the deal with that, anyway?" Grantaire snuck a peek at Feuilly's poster, some slogan about solidarity or something.

"The deal with what?"

"You know exactly what the fuck I'm talking about," Feuilly joked, blowing a puff of smoke in Grantaire's face. "Your love…rectangle."

_You said we were an accident, with accidents you'll never know what could have been  
So we were an accident…you'll always be my favorite one_

Grantaire groaned, regretting the decision as he inhaled some smoke and coughed on it. "You know what, if you find out, please do me a favor and let me know." He got up to get a beer from the fridge. "Yeah, I really, really like her. I do. Right now, it's killing me that I don't know where she is or if she's okay. She left really fast this morning, to talk to Cosette, and she hasn't texted me back since."

Feuilly sat up, serious for the first time all afternoon. "You care about her, obviously. Why do you think she spends all her time here with you? Why do you think Marius is so jealous?"

"You think he's jealous of me?"

Feuilly walked over to the kitchen, clapping Grantaire on the shoulder. "Maybe it's a good thing you're a writer and not an art major with me. You're blind, man."

"I'm allowed to take art classes as an elective if I want," Grantaire retaliated. He stuck his tongue out for good measure.

"Seriously?!" Jehan's voice rang clear from the entryway. "You guys had the nerve to get high in my apartment and not even invite me?"

Grantaire laughed, and settled into the sofa. His poster, half-finished, lay forgotten on the floor. Feuilly stretched back out in front of his own poster to finish it, humming to avoid Jehan's jibes.

Not long later, Grantaire and Jehan simultaneously received identical messages from Combeferre. "_Found Eponine walking around crying. She looks like hell. Be at your place in 5_," Grantaire read solemnly, Jehan nodding at him to confirm he'd gotten the same one.

"You know what, let's go get some takeout and booze for dinner, Feuilly," Jehan offered. Feuilly agreed, and as they shut the door behind them, Grantaire was thankful for the privacy his friends allowed him.

Grantaire rushed around the apartment, trying to clean it up. He lit a candle since Eponine always complained about the smell when they smoked in the apartment, and gathered all of the art supplies into a pile on an armchair. He was a little foggy from smoking, and he hated waiting for her. He stood by the fridge and drank until his phone buzzed, what seemed like an eternity later, with another text from Combeferre. _Be right down, it's just me here now. Thanks._

He ran down the stairs, nearly knocking Eponine over as he burst into the entry hall. Grantaire saw Combeferre wave goodbye from his car, and drove away. "Hey," he said, pulling Eponine into a hug. "I'm so glad you're okay. I've been…worried. Really worried about you." She tensed as he placed a soft kiss to her lips.

"Can we talk?" she asked timidly. "Ugh, that sounded bad. I don't mean it in a bad way or anything," she said quickly as Grantaire's face froze with terror.

_We could have been (We could have been again)  
Instead of accidental running always running (Why can't you believe)  
We could have been (We could have been again)_

"Sure…let's go up, Jehan and Feuilly are out getting dinner and stuff," Grantaire said, taking her hand as he led her up the stairs to his floor. Eponine followed without another word, the whole way into Grantaire's room. She sat at the foot of his bed instead of curled up beside him like usual.

"I've been worried sick about you," he said quietly.

"So worried that you had to get high?" Eponine accused, wrinkling her nose. He sighed apologetically. "I found out, well, Cosette found out, what happened with Marius." Without looking him in the eye, Eponine recounted, as quickly as she could, what had happened. That Marius had gotten her pregnant, his aunt had shamed her into an abortion, and Marius hadn't forgiven her for it. That she wondered if he would forgive her if he knew Eponine had been lied to by his aunt.

Grantaire thought his heart was going to split. It was too full. "'Ponine," he said. "Look at me." He scooted down the bed so that he was beside her, and took her cheek in his hand, his thumb wiping away her fresh tears. "This is why you wanted to drink so much?"

"Yeah…It sounds stupid, I know. But Marius' aunt really made me feel like shit about myself. Some of the things she said to me…When I can't sleep at night, it's because her words won't stop playing on a loop in my head. When I'm too sad to get out of bed in the morning, it's because I wonder what my daughter would be like," Eponine explained. Grantaire was crying now, too.

"Look, 'Ponine, when we started…Hooking up," he said quickly. "I was fine with it. I thought you'd get bored or grow out of your drinking phase or whatever. I didn't know it was this bad." He tried to kiss her, but she turned away just slightly.

_Long winded promises of future company; up close the sound remains the same  
Without the reign of terror over every momentary change we are exactly as before_

He pressed his palms to his eyes, rubbing them. "But all day today, I was worried about you. Knowing that you were away from me, and wouldn't talk to me, it hurt. I l-"

"Don't you dare go there, Grantaire," she choked out as she cried harder. "I bet you're too drunk to remember this tomorrow anyway," she said cruelly.

Grantaire's chest ached. He screwed up; her walls were back up. "Eponine, come on, please. Please just let me love you."

"I can't," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. "Last time I let someone love me, it turned me into this monster."

His head spun with confusion. "Look, I can't even pretend to understand what you're going through. But I _fucking love you_, okay? I want to be there for you." This whole conversation, they had been shifting uncomfortably on the bed, Eponine inching away and Grantaire trying to get closer to her. "Please?"

"No," she said simply. She hadn't gone over this one with Cosette. This was raw, unexpected, and she couldn't stop herself.

Grantaire was beyond paralyzed. He couldn't move as he watched Eponine walk slowly from his room, couldn't move as he heard his door shut as she left.

_You hit the road and left me an ocean, I can't swim in the silence of your skin  
Please let me inside the time I had to forget you  
Inside no chance of us at all_

Thank you so, so much to everyone reviewing/following this, it means so much! Also I have the best beta ever so this has really been an awesome thing to write.

This song is My Favorite Accident by Motion City Soundtrack. I didn't plan on using the same band or artist more than once but this is one of my all-time favorite songs and it's just too perfect here.


	9. Grace is Gone

It's not even fair how wonderful the comments my beta's (ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo) comments on my chapters are. I almost feel bad I'm the only one who gets to read/laugh/cry about them. xo

_Neon shines through smoky eyes tonight  
It's 2 am, I'm drunk again, it's heavy on my mind_

Jehan and Feuilly showed back up at the apartment, towing Courfeyrac along with lots of Chinese takeout and booze. "Grantaaaaiiiire! Eponine! I'm throwing a surprise party for you, get your asses out here, clothed or not," Courfeyrac called in the direction of Grantaire's room. An odd stillness settled over the apartment as the three friends listened for the others.

"I don't think they're here," Jehan said. He set down the bags of food he was carrying and walked gingerly toward Grantaire's room. It was still a little light outside, but too dark for Grantaire to be sitting on his bed with no light on. Feuilly and Courfeyrac followed him, arriving at Grantaire's door just in time to see Jehan flick it on, bathing the room in a harsh fluorescent glow.

Grantaire was lying on his bed, fully clothed on top of the covers. He didn't look up as his friends entered the room. "Where's Eponine?" Jehan asked. Grantaire shrugged his shoulders noncommittally.

Jehan pulled Grantaire up into a sitting position. "She's gone. Done," Grantaire offered. He didn't know what else to say. He would never betray Eponine's trust. Out of everything she told him, and the horrible things she had been put through in the last couple of months, there was one bottom line that Grantaire heard. He finally looked into the faces of his three friends, their sympathy practically tangible. "I guess I wasn't enough for her."

"How do you mean?" Feuilly asked.

Grantaire shrugged again. "I told her I loved her. She told me Marius ruined her or something, and let me know that I wasn't enough to fix her."

Jehan had to ask, "Is that really what she said?" He couldn't picture that happening.

"More or less. I guess that's what I get for trying to take something seriously for once, right?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pressure you earlier, I was just being an ass," Jehan apologized.

Grantaire laughed bitterly. "It's not your fault. It was going to happen sooner or later. I fell in love with, apparently, the worst girl I could have picked."

Jehan frowned. "You don't get to pick who you fall in love with, you just do, R."

_I could never love again so much as I love you  
Where you end where I begin is like a river going through  
Take my eyes take my heart I need them no more  
If never again they fall upon the one I so adore _

"We brought Chinese food and vodka…it sounds kinda gross but I think it'll make you feel better," Courfeyrac said before Grantaire could fire a smartass comment back at Jehan. Courfeyrac's characteristic grin was glaringly absent from his face.

Grantaire nodded. He was already drunk, but if they weren't going to say anything, he sure as hell wasn't going to bring it up. The four young men gathered on the floor in the living room, dividing up the food and mixing drinks. Nobody stopped Grantaire as he took a gulp from the bottle before mixing his own drink. Grantaire sipped on his vodka and Sprite, replaying the conversation with Eponine in his mind.

"I don't think I ever loved anyone before, guys," he said numbly. He picked through his fried rice with a fork, drunk past the point of having the dexterity for chopsticks. "I don't think I like it." He couldn't really feel his hands, and the fork clattered to the floor.

"Maybe it'll be alright, R," Jehan said, eyeing him nervously. "I just texted Combeferre, I guess Eponine called him for a ride to Azelma's after she left here. Azelma won't let her do anything stupid."

Feuilly snorted, "Leaving was stupid enough in the first place."

"That's not fair, man. You don't know what she's going through," Courfeyrac said, sticking up for her. He had become rather attached to Eponine since he'd been getting to know her better.

Grantaire was fixated on one of the packages he saw sitting with the food, and he hadn't even heard his friends' conversation. Jehan had ordered Eponine's favorite, wonton soup. Grantaire picked it up and chucked the container at the wall in the kitchen, where the Styrofoam split open, and soup spilled down the wall. The other three men looked at him in shock.

"What the fuck," Jehan mumbled. "Not cool, R." He felt guilty for egging Grantaire on earlier, so he stood and went to clean the mess up with Feuilly.

"Sorry," Grantaire mumbled, embarrassed at his loss of control. His outward actions were nothing to the tumult he was feeling inside, though. "Why did she do this to me? Why the fucking fuck did she lead me on like this?"

"What do you mean?" Courfeyrac did not like the extra-negative turn Grantaire was taking.

"Well," he started, "This whole fucking mess started because she wanted to drink with me, to drown her feelings with me, cause I'm the only asshole we know who would oblige her with that." The others exchanged worried glances. "She told me I couldn't fix her, and I was too damn stupid to listen."

_Excuse me please one more drink  
Could you make it strong, cause I don't need to think  
She broke my heart my grace is gone  
One more drink and I'll move on_

"There's obviously something bigger going on with her," Jehan said. He remembered the conversation he had with Grantaire over breakfast weeks ago, how Grantaire couldn't figure out the cause of Eponine's sadness.

"You don't fucking say," Grantaire said sarcastically, sipping his drink.

Courfeyrac, Jehan, and Feuilly took turns consoling Grantaire the rest of the evening, trying to keep him from getting out of hand. They played video games until they realized Grantaire barely had any control over his controller, and Courfeyrac took his phone for safekeeping. None of them judged him for falling apart when it had been Eponine who had unwittingly been holding him together for weeks.

"You don't know how much I appreciate this," Eponine said to Combeferre earlier that evening. He and Enjolras had been on their way to meet Bossuet, Joly, Bahorel, and some others when Combeferre got her text, asking to be picked up.

Enjolras kept glancing back at her in the rearview mirror. "Do you have something to say, Enjolras?" she snapped at him.

He was rather taken aback. People just didn't _snap_ at him. "No, no. I was just wondering if you're alright."

It was Eponine's turn to be surprised. "I honestly don't know," she shrugged. "But thanks anyway."

"Where am I taking you?" Combeferre asked.

Eponine didn't answer at first. "I need another favor," she said slowly. "I need to talk to Marius. But you can't tell anyone I'm meeting him. Azelma said she'd cover for me." Combeferre raised his eyebrows. "I know you're above that, and better than that…but I'm not. I promise I wouldn't ask you to do this if it wasn't really important," she insisted.

_One drink to remember then another to forget  
How could I ever dream to find sweet love like you again  
One drink to remember and another to forget_

Enjolras was definitely on edge. "Eponine, if he did anything to hurt you, I'm not above fucking his shit up," he warned. Enjolras had not approved of Marius' recent childish behavior when it came to Eponine and Grantaire. "In all the time I've known Grantaire, he hasn't been as happy as he's been with you."

Eponine felt a guilty little tug at her heart. She hadn't told Combeferre or Enjolras about her most recent conversation with Grantaire, and they hadn't asked. Combeferre had barely left her at Grantaire's apartment for a half hour, and didn't want to pry.

Eponine murmured something unintelligible in response, and the three sat in silence the rest of the short ride to Marius' apartment. "I'll have Azelma pick me up; thank you so much," she said as the two dropped her off. Her heart fluttered in her chest, and her palms were shaking slightly.

After Combeferre's car was out of sight, she texted Marius, asking him to let her in. They hadn't spoken directly to each other in months. She bit her lip nervously and rocked back and forth in her Converse as she waited for Marius to answer the door.

"Hey," Marius said tentatively.

"Hey," Eponine automatically responded. "Please let me in, we really need to talk."

"I don't even have anything to say to you," Marius sighed. Eponine's eyes watered with tears, and she swore under her breath. She didn't plan on being this emotional this fast.

"I need to talk to you. About something Cosette told me." Finally, she had his attention. Marius reluctantly opened the door, dialing Cosette on his phone. Eponine pushed past him, snagged a box of tissues she saw on a table, and sat on a chair in the living room. She could hear Marius out in the hallway, talking heatedly in a low voice. She played nervously with the frayed hem of her (Grantaire's) sweatpants as she waited.

Finally, he came into the living room with her. He sat on the couch opposite her, looking frazzled. "Give me your phone," Eponine asked. "I want to talk to you, but I don't even know who you are anymore. I don't want either of us escaping from this conversation or texting other people about it while it's happening," she said bravely.

Marius, to her relief, agreed. He turned off his phone and tossed it to another couch. Eponine followed suit. "So you're only talking to me because Cosette said so?" she asked.

He rolled his eyes, but conceded. "Pretty much, yeah."

"She's way too good for you," Eponine said, before she could stop herself. "Sorry, not doing myself any favors, I know."

"Cosette said you and I need to talk about why we broke up. I can't understand why she cares so much. I never told her about…what you did," Marius said carefully.

"I know you're naïve, Marius, but you can't honestly look me in the eyes and tell me you've _accidentally_ been a douchebag to me recently. Especially since I started seeing Grantaire. Everyone notices, especially your girlfriend."

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "It's really hard for me to even look at you after what you've done." Eponine steeled herself. She knew he was going to say this, but knowing didn't make it sting any less. "I can't forgive you for going behind my back like that."

_Excuse me please, one more drink  
Could you make it strong, cause I don't need to think  
She broke my heart, my grace is gone  
One more drink and I'll move on, one more drink and I'll be gone_

Eponine pressed her eyes shut. She didn't want to see his face for this. "Marius, I have to stop you right there. Every time we tried to talk about this before, this is approximately where civility fell apart. Just shut your mouth and listen to me this time. It's what Cosette wants," she added weakly.

"Do you remember your Aunt Gillenormand allowing Cosette to use her computer?" Marius just nodded. "She left her e-mail up, and Cosette saw my name and started reading. She was reassuring another family member, Cosette doesn't remember who, that no, you weren't having any more problems from 'that Thenardier bitch.'" She stopped to grab a tissue. "Marius, think of the worst insult you can throw at me, about my personality or my family or my upbringing. When you told your aunt I was pregnant, she amplified all of the worst things a person could say to me to levels I didn't even know existed. She convinced me that it…the abortion…was what you wanted. That having a child while we were in college would ruin your future. It made sense to me at the time."

Marius was pale and clammy. "Cosette saw these e-mails?"

"I didn't stutter. Yes, she did." Eponine was slightly irritated that Marius doubted her, as if she would make something like this up. "She told me everything…this morning." Eponine had to think before she realized how much had happened to her just that day.

"Oh my God." Marius stood up and paced around the living room. He stared out the window for a few minutes without saying anything, but Eponine refused to be the one to break the awkward silence. "I'm used to my family criticizing me for my taste in politics and friends and my lifestyle but I swear, I never thought they would use their hate to hurt you," Marius finally said. He knelt by Eponine and took her hands in his. "And now I'm no less of a bastard than the rest of them."

"You really are sorry?" she asked timidly.

"You have no idea," Marius said softly.

"That's all I need to know."

"I'm stepping out for a cigarette, care to join me, Courf?" Feuilly asked. Courfeyrac agreed, a little too quickly. His grin still hadn't returned after putting up with Grantaire. He had been difficult all night, and an angry drunk at that. It had been a while since he'd drank like this, and his friends were feeling the strain.

_You think of things impossible and the sun'll refuse to shine  
I woke with you beside me your cold hand lay in mine_

It wasn't even midnight yet, but Jehan was exhausted. He felt like he had been babysitting. Grantaire was finally asleep on the couch, and for the first time in hours, Jehan finally had the privilege of a few minutes of peace and quiet.

If he wasn't so tired, and Grantaire wasn't so often drunk, Jehan might have noticed that something was wrong. Grantaire's skin was far too pale, slightly blue tinged. His skin was cool to the touch, and he was barely breathing. Jehan accidentally fell asleep, but he was roused awake some time later when Courfeyrac and Feuilly returned.

Jehan blinked sleepily, the alcohol making it extra hard for him to wake. He could hear Feuilly yelling into a phone, he thought, and Courfeyrac's black curls bobbed in and out of focus in front of him. He instantly sobered up as he connected some of the words Courfeyrac was shouting. Alcohol poisoning.

_Excuse me please, one more drink  
Could you make it strong, cause I don't need to think  
She broke my heart, my grace is gone  
One more drink and I'll move on, one more drink and I'll be gone  
One more drink, my grace is gone_

Song is "Grace is Gone" by Dave Matthews Band. Every single one of their songs is really love/hate for me and this is soooo much love.

Also while writing the last chapter and this one I felt kinda bad for how mean I'm being to these characters and I wondered if it's all too much too fast. Luckily, I usually watch Grey's Anatomy on Netflix as background noise while I write, and I took a writing break and realized that that show puts their characters through the wringer ten times worse than this in like two episodes.


	10. Back 2 Good

I am so, so sorry for the like three week hiatus since my last chapter! Being an adult is hard. I moved five hours from home, for a job, since I started this fic and things got really crazy. I promise I'm finishing this one soon, and I have another totally different fic started! Song is Back 2 Good by Matchbox 20. Enjoy xoxo

_It's nothing, it's so normal, you just stand there  
I could say so much, but I don't go there, cause I don't want to  
I was thinking if you were lonely  
Maybe we could leave here and no one would know  
At least not to the point that we would think so _

Cosette felt emotionally drained after Eponine's visit. Valjean was reading in the living room, and had granted the girls privacy while they were talking. Of course, he could tell something was wrong with his daughter. Cosette entered the living room and sat on the couch with him, and she could read the worry in his eyes as surely as he could see it in hers.

"Are you alright?" Valjean asked cautiously. He sometimes found it hard to walk the line between being loving and being overprotective. He folded the newspaper and set it aside, giving Cosette his full attention. "I don't mean to pry but it isn't easy for me to see you so sad."

She tried her hardest to give him a genuine, albeit small, smile. "I think I'm okay, Papa. Just going through some stuff." Valjean decided against asking her to clarify just who was going through what. "I think I need to get out of the house though. Is it alright if I go to Joly and Bossuet's?"

Valjean was rather touched that, even at her age and with her independence, his daughter still asked his blessing when it wasn't necessary.

An hour later, Cosette was sitting at the little kitchen table in Joly and Bossuet's apartment. It was a small but cozy place, littered with textbooks, medical supplies, and knickknacks. Cosette was toying with a stethoscope, unaware of Joly's intense gaze, when Bossuet said, "Oh she's not going to break it, lighten up!" Joly made an indignant noise, and his indiscernible mumbling was cut off by the sound of Bossuet and Cosette's laughter.

"Sorry, Joly," she said, her grin giving away the fact that she wasn't. "But in all seriousness, I want to talk to you guys."

"About Marius?" Bossuet asked.

Cosette nodded. "You two have the most normal relationship out of anyone we know. I'd really value your opinion on some things." It was harder for her to get the words out than she had anticipated. She didn't often feel vulnerable.

Joly was still itching to take the stethoscope from her hands, but his expression softened. "Is everything okay?"

"I'm trying to think of the easiest way to put this…Basically Marius and Eponine broke up because of a really, really bad misunderstanding. I figured it out last night, and I told Eponine this morning. She's over Marius' place right now, talking about it I guess." Cosette decided it was a good thing she had forgone makeup today; her voice cracked a little and a hot burning in her throat warned her that she was about to cry again. "Shit, I didn't mean to get emotional, sorry."  
_  
Everyone here, knows everyone here is thinking about somebody else  
It's best if we all keep it under our heads  
I couldn't tell, if anyone here was feeling the way I do  
But I'm lonely now, and I don't know how to get it back to good _

Bossuet moved his hand from where it had been resting on Joly's hand to pass Cosette a box of tissues that was in reach. "Fuck," he cursed as he knocked over his glass of water in the process. He made a mad dash for a towel to clean up the spill. Despite her heavy heart, Cosette nearly laughed when Joly looked exasperatedly in his boyfriend's direction. Bossuet's clumsiness and bad luck never failed.

Joly turned back to Cosette. "That makes you more decent than probably a lot of people, helping Marius to get along with his ex."

"Eponine and I were foster siblings when we were kids," Cosette explained. "She isn't just a random person to me. She and Marius both deserved the truth." Bossuet rejoined them at the table. "I don't regret being honest with them, not one bit. I guess I'm just scared for what happens now," she admitted.

"Cosette, you really should hear the way Marius talks about you when you're not with us," Bossuet offered. "I know he's been acting pissy recently, but I promise he never mooned over Eponine the way he does over you." Joly nodded in agreement.

"I know he loves me, but if there's even the tiniest bit of him that still loves Eponine…" she trailed off, unsure of what to say. "Maybe they were meant to be, and I'm in their way."

Joly bit his lip, as he did when he was deep in thought. "I don't think that's true." He hesitated before adding, "I probably shouldn't say this, but I think he wanted to be with you even before he was with Eponine."

"I think he was scared to ask you out, to be honest," Bossuet chuckled. "Eponine had a crush on Marius since freshman year, and she never really acted on it until he started talking about you nonstop."

"Oh," Cosette sighed. "God, this is a mess."

"Well, I think Eponine's really happy with Grantaire. Whatever they're doing," Joly mused. "Those two are good for each other, I think."

Cosette set down the stethoscope. "Honestly, I thought so too. I'm just afraid that the thing they are reconciling over is enough to trump everything else."

_This don't mean that, you own me  
This ain't no good, in fact it's phony as hell  
But things worked out just like you wanted to  
If you see me out you don't know me  
Try to turn your head, try to give me some room  
To figure out just what I'm going to do _

An uncomfortable silence settled over them. "I wish I knew what to say," Bossuet said softly. "I think you'll just have to wait this one out."

"You can wait it out with us, if you'd like," Joly offered. "Some of the guys are meeting for drinks in a bit."

"That sounds really good, actually," Cosette decided.

Across town, Bahorel greeted Enjolras and Combeferre as they walked into the bar. "Thanks for showing up on time, guys, it wasn't awkward sitting at a table for ten by myself," he joked.

"We had a situation," Enjolras said, then looked around the bar for a waitress to flag down to take their order.

"Had to do a favor for Eponine," Combeferre added. His phone buzzed in his pocket as soon as he sat down across from Bahorel.

"Is everything okay?" Bahorel asked.

Combeferre frowned at his phone as he read the message. "Courfeyrac just texted me and said he was on his way here when Jehan and Feuilly called him to get dinner with Eponine and Grantaire." He looked up from his phone. "Enjolras and I dropped Eponine off to talk to Grantaire earlier. Courf said she left Grantaire alone in the apartment before the rest of them got back."

"That can't be good," Bahorel said. "Bet you twenty bucks she's with Marius right now."

"What makes you say that?" Enjolras asked. He hadn't forgotten how defeated Eponine had looked earlier, or how desperate she was when she asked him and Combeferre to keep her whereabouts a secret. He thought this relationship drama was getting old, fast.

_And everyone here, hates everyone here for doing just like they do  
It's best if we all keep this quiet instead  
And I couldn't tell, why everyone here was doing me like they do  
But I'm sorry now, and I don't know how, to get it back to good _

"Just got a text from Joly. He and Bossuet are bringing Cosette here with them in a little," Bahorel said. "Who else is left?"

"I think she's with Azelma," Combeferre dutifully supplied.

Bahorel shook his head. "No, she's out of town this weekend, visiting her folks."

"Well, this is going to be a long night," Combeferre sighed.

Eponine had waited for Marius to apologize to her for months, and now he finally had. He took his seat again on the couch, looking as if he would get sick at any second. Eponine couldn't help but feel a mean little stab of joy at seeing him upset with himself. They sat in an uncomfortable silence for a few minutes after she accepted his apology.

"Now what do we do?" Marius finally asked.

Eponine closed her eyes and thought. "I actually don't know. I thought I would."

"Did you tell Grantaire?"

She nodded. Marius swore. "He's not going to tell anyone," Eponine said confidently. "He isn't like that. Besides, it doesn't matter now anyway. I broke up with him today, if you want to call it that."

Marius paled. "Why did you do that? Right before you came over here?"

"Don't worry," Eponine smirked. "I didn't come here to try to get you back or whatever. I wouldn't do that to Cosette. She's a really, really good person."

"But do you still love me?" Marius was afraid to hear the answer. He loved Cosette; he couldn't bear to see the look on Eponine's face if he rejected her yet again. He could feel the dull thud of his heart in his chest.

"No, I don't," Eponine said honestly. "That's actually why I had to end things with Grantaire. I don't think I'm capable of caring about another person. At least not in the way I would need to for a proper relationship."

"Is that my fault, too?"

She shook her head no. "I think it's just how I am."  
_  
Everyone here, is wondering what it's like to be with somebody else  
Everyone here's to blame  
Everyone here, gets caught up in the pleasure of the pain  
Everyone hides shades of shame, but looking inside we're the same  
And we're all grown now, but we don't know how to get it back to good _

"Don't put yourself down like that, Eponine. I know we weren't very good as a couple, but you can't apply our situation to Grantaire."

"Heartbreak is heartbreak, Marius," Eponine retorted. "Grantaire might actually be more self-destructive than I am. I can't afford to care about him when I can't even take care of myself." She recalled all of their drunken nights, silly banter, and quick fucks. They shared his bed, went shot for shot, and stole kisses when they pretended their friends weren't watching. "I think maybe it's better to let it go before I fuck something up."

Marius shook his head. "I still don't regret being with you, Eponine," he said kindly. "Especially after today. All the mistakes, even the ones that hurt, got us here. And here isn't so bad, is it?" Marius glanced at the clock. He and Eponine must have been talking for longer than they had realized; it was just past midnight.

Eponine didn't say anything. She just shrugged, out of answers for the day.

"Would it be alright if I got my phone back? I'd like to tell Cosette that everything's going to be okay. As long as that's what you think, too," Marius said.

"I forgive you," Eponine said. She didn't exactly answer his question, but it was all she cared to muster. It was easier than thinking about Cosette, Grantaire, or the daughter that never was.

Marius retrieved his phone while Eponine tried to clear her mind. He interrupted her silence mere seconds later. "Oh _fucking hell_," Marius gasped.

Eponine dashed across the room to where she had put her phone. Twenty, _twenty,_ missed calls and even more unread texts.

_Everyone here, knows everyone here is thinking 'bout somebody else  
It's best if we all keep this under our heads  
I couldn't tell, if anyone here was feeling the way I do  
But it's over now, and I don't know how, it's over now  
There's no getting back to good_


	11. End of an Anchor

_I was away for a while but I'm hoping someday you'll forgive me  
Though I don't deserve it, I'll cherish it well if you give me one of your new starts  
Just one more last chance, I swear that I'll earn it if you front me for now  
I'm good for it I swear, I'm better now I swear _

It was just before midnight when Enjolras received a phone call from Feuilly. He was still at the bar with some of their friends. He sighed, but of course he would answer. He wasn't one to ignore a call from a friend. "I'll be right back," he informed Combeferre, before he turned to push through the crowd in the direction of the door. Just before the call went to his voicemail, he was able to answer.

"Hello?"

"Enjolras?"

"Sorry I didn't answer more quickly, Feuilly, it was really loud in the bar tonight and-"

"Are you okay to drive?"

"Yeah, I haven't had much to drink, I already told Combeferre I could drive-"

"Come to R and Jehan's apartment. Now. It's an emergency." Enjolras was sprinting from his post outside the bar to Combeferre's car before Feuilly had even finished the sentence. The urgency in Feuilly's voice was clear even through the alcohol-induced slurring. Enjolras fumbled for the spare key he knew Combeferre had hidden in one of the wheel wells. Combeferre would forgive him for stealing his car later.

"What did he do?" Unfortunately, Enjolras didn't have to specify the person he knew was the cause of the emergency. There was silence on the other end of the line. "Damn it, Feuilly, what the fuck is going on?"

Feuilly sounded embarrassed when he answered. Enjolras was in command of Combeferre's car, flying toward the apartment. "None of us are sober enough to drive to the hospital, we think Grantaire needs his stomach pumped or something…drank too much."

_In earlier days, they'd persecute people, they'd carry them off, and hobble their legs  
For lesser offenses, than how I have harmed you, and still you allow me to walk free of pain _

"Is there a particular reason you didn't call an ambulance?"

"We figured you'd get here quicker."

"I will, but seriously?" Enjolras was secretly flattered.

A few minutes later, Combeferre's car screeched to a halt in the yard in front of Grantaire's building with deep tire tracks imprinted in the grass behind it. Enjolras didn't have time to deal with things like parking spaces and sidewalks. Jehan, Courfeyrac and Feuilly had wrapped Grantaire in a blanket and carried him outside to wait. They had just gotten there when Enjolras pulled up.

Enjolras got out of the car, opened the back door, and started barking orders and asking questions.

"Courfeyrac, call Combeferre and explain this to him. He's probably going to need a cab home."

"You want me to tell him you took his car?" Courfeyrac asked. Enjolras nodded, and Courfeyrac disappeared back inside.

"Feuilly, has he thrown up yet? How long has he been unconscious?" Jehan and Feuilly had just settled Grantaire across the back seat.

"No, he hasn't, and we really don't know. We thought he was just asleep like usual," Feuilly answered bashfully.

"Alright." Enjolras nodded calmly. "You both have to stay here with Courfeyrac. Or if you leave, take him. Stick together. You need to text everyone and tell them I have him and they shouldn't panic. I'll tell you when I know anything." They nodded in agreement.

Enjolras returned to the car, made sure Grantaire was buckled in, and drove like the demons of hell were chasing him to the closest hospital.

This, unfortunately, wasn't the first time Enjolras had been in this situation. He sighed as he waited impatiently at a stop light, glancing in the rear view mirror at Grantaire. He wasn't sure who else knew about the other two times this had happened, but he was positive he didn't want there to be a fourth time.

One way or another, all of the friends made it to the bar where Combeferre, Bahorel, Cosette, Joly and Bossuet were stationed. When they were kicked out at closing, they relocated to a 24-hour McDonalds a few blocks away. They were scattered over a few booths, and Eponine sat at one end by herself, pretending to drink a milkshake someone got for her. Probably Cosette, she thought, but she wasn't entirely sure. She watched the group of people she had come to call her family, and a sad smile formed on her face. She was truly happy to see Marius and Cosette; she knew deep down it never would have worked out between her and Marius.

_Though I punish myself, I will never settle the debts I've incurred  
For scorning the face of absolute beauty and measureless grace  
And though I once mocked you, I'm dying to pay for it now _

Courfeyrac slid over in his seat so he was close to Eponine. "I wanted to apologize," he said. "I feel responsible for this…I'm so sorry." Eponine hugged him, letting him know that she didn't think he was to blame.

"Will you come have a smoke with me?" she asked into his ear. He agreed, and a few minutes later they were shivering in the chilly late-night air, trying to light their cigarettes. Courfeyrac cupped his hands so Eponine could light hers, and he expertly lit his off of hers. They stood in silence, but it wasn't awkward. They had become close in the time she had been with Grantaire.

"Courf, I have to tell you something," Eponine said after a few minutes. "I'm leaving."

He was coming down from being drunk earlier that night, and blinded by grief and guilt. Eponine's confession only confused him further. "Why? What do you mean?"

"I'm staying until we know he's okay. Then I'm gone."

"Gone where?"

"I haven't decided yet. But I won't be back."

Courfeyrac put his cigarette out on the wall and dropped it. "You can't," he begged. "Please don't leave us. Don't leave _him_. He loves you, you know." He scuffed his shoe into the pavement.

Eponine felt her heart start to crack, threatening to break into a million pieces. "That's why I have to go. Before I hurt him more than I already have. He doesn't deserve that." Courfeyrac glared at her. "Please, Courf, promise me you'll make sure he's okay."

"It should be you making sure he's okay," he accused.

"I know," she whispered. One more stress fracture and surely her heart would shatter.

Courfeyrac suddenly picked up his phone, answering a call. He talked in one-word sentences and the call was over quickly. "It was Enjolras," he said. "Grantaire is going to be fine. Hospital said he was no worse than any of the other 20 college kids whose stomachs they have to pump every weekend."

"Really?"

He nodded. "Yeah, no brain damage or anything crazy like that. Enjolras gets to bring him home in the morning…If Combeferre doesn't drive to the hospital and kill him for taking his car first." Courfeyrac laughed for a second before he remembered how pissed he was at Eponine. "I guess you can leave now," he said. Eponine grimaced at the disappointment in his tone, but she walked away just the same.

Grantaire woke up the next morning feeling like his body was on fire and paralyzed at the same time. He looked around the unfamiliar room, finding Enjolras sprawled on what would have been another patient's bed on the other side of the room, his blonde curls visible over the top of a newspaper.

"Enjolras?" he tried to say. His throat was dry and the word came out as a strangled gasp.

"Glad you're awake, you fucking idiot," Enjolras said. "You could really hurt yourself, you know." He got up from the bed and handed a bottle of water to his friend.

Grantaire just put the bottle on the table beside him, and put his pillow over his face and groaned into it. He peeked out from under it to ask, "Did I get arrested? A public intoxication citation?"

"Unfortunately, you didn't, it probably would have taught you a lesson," Enjolras said. Grantaire wasn't sure if he was joking or not. There were purple circles under his eyes and Grantaire thought he looked exhausted.

"Did you bring me here from my apartment? The last thing I remember is Courfeyrac trying to make me eat Chinese food." Grantaire paused for a few seconds, trying to piece together the fragments of memories floating around his mind. "Oh. Eponine…dumped me, I think."

_So hand me the rocks to help weigh me down  
And tether my legs with a cord tightly bound  
To the end of an anchor thrown into the sound  
And test me to see if I will rise against the worst that it can get _

Enjolras frowned. "Yeah, Feuilly called me. Sorry about Eponine. I don't know the whole story…I don't think anyone actually does, really. We just know you guys got into a fight or something. Cosette and Marius said there was a misunderstanding but it was cleared up."

"Well, that's news to me," Grantaire said bitterly. "I fucking told her I loved her! She basically said it wasn't enough for her and she left my apartment. Has she been by?"

The hope in his voice saddened Enjolras. "No." A nasty thought crossed Enjolras' mind. "Did you do this to get her attention?"

"No! No, I just got carried away. I drank…a lot. You'd think I would know better by now," Grantaire mused.

"Well, that's a relief at least."

"Don't change the subject, Enjolras. Is she really that mad at me?"

The blonde sighed. "I don't know what happened. I guess this morning she told Courfeyrac she was leaving, for good or something, and she hasn't responded to anyone since."

Grantaire felt the pain all over again. "What is so fucking wrong with me, Enjolras? Marius dumped her, which is a damn mess in itself, and she stayed even though it meant seeing him every day." A realization hit him. _I'm worse to be around than the guy whose family made her get a fucking abortion. How is that even possible? _Grantaire was overcome with nausea, and Enjolras shoved a trash can under his face just in time.

As if on cue, Grantaire's phone buzzed from the bedside table. Enjolras handed it to him, and took the trash can and immediately called for a nurse. The message was from Cosette: _R, we're going to find her, I promise._

Grantaire held his phone out to Enjolras so he could read the message. "Should I tell her to stop looking? I don't even know if I should bother."

"Do you love her?"

The question took Grantaire off guard, so he blurted the first thing that came to mind. "Yeah, I do. I love how her eyelashes touch her cheeks when she is sleeping, and how she steals all the blankets at night and blames it on me. I think it's cute when she wears my clothes without telling me, and I don't even get mad when she finishes the shampoo or eats half of the food in my apartment-" Grantaire realized how he was rambling, and who he was rambling to, and he blushed as he cut himself off.

Enjolras, despite the circumstances, laughed. "I'm pretty sure you gave Marius hell for babbling about Cosette kind of like you just did about Eponine. But I think that's enough indication that no, you should let Cosette find her. Eponine seems to trust her."

"If I didn't owe you for bringing me here, I'd be telling you to fuck off for that Marius comment right about now," Grantaire replied. He finally picked up the water bottle and started drinking.

Enjolras ignored that. "Do you feel well enough to convince the nurse to let me take you home?"

"Not really, but can we try anyway?"

"Absolutely. Combeferre really wants his car back," Enjolras snickered.

When Eponine left her friends at McDonalds, she made her way as fast as she could to Grantaire's apartment. She knew it would be empty for a while, and she wanted to remove every trace of herself from the rooms. She felt a lump in her throat rise as she let herself into the apartment, and left her key hanging on the key hook on the wall.

Eponine went straight to Grantaire's room, where the most damage was done. She found the biggest duffle bag in sight, and started to erase herself. She took pictures off of the walls, her cereal out of the kitchen, and anything else she could find that could remind Grantaire of what they had, or what they lacked.

_I wasn't well for a while, I savored the things that I knew were sure to destroy me  
And that seemed to hold me, that seemed to carry me  
Where I couldn't go on the strength of my own  
Well, I should've known that gets me nowhere  
I've learned that now I swear _

When she was done, she gathered up the bags and called Azelma. "Hey, I know you're not here right now, but can you ask your roommate to let me in your apartment?"

"Is everything alright?"

"Please come back, Zelma. I need help. Things are really, really bad. I just need somewhere to stay until after finals, then I can go."

"Just knock when you get there, I'll call her and have her let you in. I'll be back first thing in the morning, okay?"

Eponine thanked God for Azelma's generosity and slung her bags over her shoulder. She looked at her key hanging by itself on the hook, and shut the door behind her as she left. The walk to Azelma's apartment wasn't long. She collapsed into her friend's bed, and finally fell asleep for the first time since Cosette called her nearly 24 hours ago.

_So hand me the rocks to help weigh me down  
And tether my legs with a cord tightly bound  
To then end of an anchor thrown into the sound  
And test me to see if I will rise against the worst that it can get_

Well, I wasn't sure that I could  
But, I can

So I heard this song, End of an Anchor by Dashboard Confessional, for the first time a few weeks ago. It seriously reminded me of the Grantaire/Enjolras relationship that usually occurs in modern AU stories. Like…Grantaire is sorry for screwing up again but Enjolras always gives him more chances to be friends. Or more if that's what the author calls for. Hell, that's basically how they are in the book.


	12. Road to Recovery

_He never thought someone would come along  
And show him a feeling he's always dreamed of  
She didn't plan on falling in love  
Upset that balance she's wanted so long_

Several weeks later, the end of their spring finals week had finally arrived for the friends. Cosette had promised Grantaire lunch. The table she snagged was on the main floor of one of their class buildings, right by the windows. The cherry blossom trees outside the window couldn't have been more beautiful in bloom. "Have you heard anything new?" Grantaire asked Cosette as he sipped his coffee.

"No, I haven't," Cosette replied. She ran her hands through her long blonde hair, as she did when she was frazzled. "I still haven't heard from her since…the night you got sick," she said.

"That's an awfully nice way to say 'the night I almost drank myself to death'" Grantaire snorted. Cosette smiled shyly. Their group of friends had taken to treading lightly when Grantaire was around, even though he was content to act like it hadn't happened. Heartbreak didn't suit him well, and it was showing. Cosette's eyes couldn't help but keep returning to the things that worried her: Grantaire's unkempt hair, the purplish circles under his eyes, and the way his hands shook around his cup of coffee. It was spiked, naturally, but less than it normally would have been.

"I think Azelma knows where she's staying, but she won't budge," Cosette said. "She's even stopped speaking to Bahorel because he wouldn't stop asking her."

"I just don't understand what I did to her. I would be there for her no matter what other stupid stuff happened."

"I know, R. I wish I had better information for you." Over the past few weeks, Cosette had shared every scrap she knew about Eponine with Grantaire, in his search to find her.

_This road to recovery has taken all I have  
It seems hard as I try to succumb once again_

"I just don't understand. She came after _me. _She wanted me to help her get through some things. I didn't exactly plan on falling in love with her…it just happened." Grantaire winced. "It wasn't enough to keep her here, though."

Cosette's romantic heart broke a little bit. "You can't blame yourself, R," she said. "Marius and I aren't perfect, either." Grantaire looked her in the eyes. "No couple is perfect. She's going to come back. She's a broken soul, but not a cruel one."

"I really, really hope you're right," Grantaire said softly.

"Hey," Jehan said, sliding into the booth next to Grantaire. "Care if I crash your lunch?"

"Of course not," Cosette said. She nibbled on a corner of her sandwich.

"Going to turn your photography final in after this, R?"

Grantaire made a face at Jehan's words. "Yeah, I am. I'm still not completely happy with it but it's really the best I can come up with at this point."

"Same here," Jehan said. He hoped his relief didn't show on his face. Eponine hadn't come to class in the past couple of weeks, but he didn't want to risk having Grantaire turn his work in alone, in case she showed up.

The trio ate their lunches, mulling over the possibilities of where Eponine could be. She had deleted everything she used on the Internet, and all calls and texts to her went unanswered. Nobody had seen her at a bar or restaurant. Eponine might have vanished except that, from time to time, one of their friends caught brief glimpses of her on campus.

_Well he lost control and gave up his heart  
To follow the girl that he's always dreamed of  
She pulled away so scared of a love  
That might have been more than she had planned on_

"I think I actually almost made Enjolras cry, you know," Grantaire laughed halfheartedly.

"When he brought you back to our place?" Jehan asked. He shuddered. That had been a particularly bad morning for everyone.

"Yeah, when I started crying, looking for all her stuff," Grantaire said. "Should've taken a picture of his watery eyes for blackmail, eh?"

"Oh, I don't know about that, R," Cosette said with a devilish smile. "If he wasn't embarrassed by that picture of you two from that party I don't know what could embarrass him."

"Right, I forgot how embarrassing I am to be seen with," Grantaire snorted.

Cosette paled. "Come on, I didn't mean it like that! I'm trying to help you!"

"Stop it, both of you," Jehan insisted. "We still haven't checked the most logical place for her to be, you know."

"I really, really don't think she would be back at her parents' house, Jehan," Cosette said. "Honestly, they're pretty much the worst."

The friends didn't know that Eponine was watching them from the winding, open staircase not twenty feet away. Eponine had been running up the stairs to their photography professor's office, to turn in her final, when she heard Grantaire's voice and stopped. Her breath had hitched in her chest, and she dropped the folder containing her project.

_This road to recovery has taken all I have  
It seems hard as I try to succumb once again_

She stooped to pick it up, looking at her friends from between the rungs of the railing. _It would be so easy_, she thought, _to just go sit with them. To pretend all this didn't happen._ She almost turned around to go back down the stairs toward them. _Except it did._ She had been fighting this internal battle for weeks, and it was tearing her apart.

Eponine pulled out her phone, and against all of her better judgment, she texted Grantaire. Without looking in his direction, she ran again toward their professor's office. She intended to drop off her project and run to the place she had recently been calling home.

"We should probably get going to drop off our projects," Jehan sighed.

"Hold on," Grantaire said. He felt his phone buzz in his pocket with a text. He was sure it was just one of his friends, who had so loyally stuck by his side throughout this ordeal. "You're fucking kidding me." He held out the phone so Cosette and Jehan could read the text: _ I'm sorry. _

"If she's so sorry, where the hell is she?" Grantaire wondered out loud. He didn't know if he should be angry or relieved.

"You know what, I think I have an idea, you two go ahead. Turn your projects in, I'll call you later," Cosette said quickly. She gathered her things and all but ran from the table.

"I swear I've read every book and every poem on this planet, and I still don't understand women," Jehan said bluntly. Grantaire just shook his head in agreement, staring at the text from Eponine. The pair slowly made their way toward the main stairwell.

Cosette was waiting outside the building a few minutes later when Eponine burst out of the door that lead to the back stairwell. "Busted," the blonde stated simply.

Eponine withdrew as if she'd been slapped. She looked frightened, and just about as unkempt as Grantaire did. "I can't do this right now, Cosette," she pleaded. "I just dropped off my photography final, I have to go study for my last one. It's in the morning."

"Let me come with you, then, please," Cosette asked. "I won't even tell Grantaire I saw you if you don't want me to." At this, Eponine's expression softened a bit. "You've been on the run like a convict or something, I just want to talk."

Eponine just nodded, and motioned for Cosette to walk with her. It was strange, Cosette thought, as Eponine lead her through what felt like a maze behind and between the campus buildings, staying away from the main walkways.

"You're going to be awfully pissed off, I'm warning you," Eponine said after a few minutes. She knew there was no getting around this one.

"Why? I'm not mad at you, honestly."

"Well, it's about where I'm staying."

"You're not at home again, are you?"

"No," Eponine said, just as the girls walked onto a familiar block. It was the block that held such establishments as their favorite bars, like the Corinth (where this whole ordeal started, Eponine often noted.)

Cosette trailed a few steps behind Eponine, soaking in the warm sunshine, until the realization hit her. "You little shit!" she gasped. "How long has he been letting you stay here?" Eponine had stopped in front of a small apartment building that Cosette recognized as being owned by her father, Valjean. He owned quite a lot of apartments in the area, but he never told Cosette he was renting one to Eponine.

Eponine blushed. "Just for two weeks now. I was with Azelma for a few days but I knew you'd come looking for me there…I'm paying rent, you know, just on one of the little studios. It's not like I'm bumming the place off of him."

Cosette groaned. "So my father's been listening to me worry about your ass when he was collecting your rent money. Nice."

"Come on," Eponine offered. "I'll talk." It was enough for Cosette, who followed her up to the small studio apartment.

Eponine collapsed on the bed (Valjean had been kind enough to provide basic furnishings), and Cosette on a plush denim beanbag chair that she recognized as having been in her own room as a child.

"So are you aware that Grantaire, as he has put it, thinks that you left him because he wasn't good enough for you? He's feeling really worthless right now."

"I left him because we weren't good for each other. I leave destruction where I go," Eponine said matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, no shit you do."

Eponine started to get upset. "Look, we weren't going to work out anyway, okay? Why prolong the inevitable?"

_Well love's a bitch; relationships end  
What happens now, when that person's gone?  
The one who you thought you could always count on  
You fall in love and they fall out  
Love is a bitch; all relationships end_

"After I found out about you and Marius, I thought he and I weren't going to work out either, you know," Cosette said carefully. "I said the same thing, that we weren't good for each other. But you know what? People aren't _good_ for each other.We do hurt each other's feelings, betray each other, and stomp on each other's hearts. But that's called _living_, Eponine. And that's only a small part of it. Maybe Marius and I will break up at some point. But you know what? Until then, we're having a damn good time, and we are _happy_. Maybe not all the time, but being happy isn't a permanent thing; it's not the only thing we are supposed to feel." Cosette finished her speech a little out of breath. She had been holding that to herself ever since Courfeyrac had pointed to Eponine's retreating figure the night she left.

"I'm not apologizing either, I think you needed to hear that," Cosette said, her face flushed. Eponine was clutching her pillow to her chest, immobilized. She let out a deep breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.

"You're right," she admitted in a low whisper. She buried her face in the pillow. "I just don't know what to do. I wasn't planning on falling in love with him. I wasn't planning on causing a scene and leaving. I'm so embarrassed; I can't show my face again."

"Yes, you can," Cosette said, almost impatiently. "Don't you get it? Our friends kick ass. Enjolras doesn't give a shit when one of us takes a picture of him in a compromising situation. Courfeyrac doesn't even bat an eye when we catcall at him when one of his hookups crosses his path on campus. Joly and Bossuet laugh their asses off when Bahorel punches strangers out for being rude about them being gay. Do I have to go on? Hell, Grantaire isn't even embarrassed about having to get his stomach pumped. He was drinking again like two days later, just sad that you weren't there to drink with him."

Eponine smiled sadly at that. "I feel like I broke up with all of you, not just R."

"Well, I think it's safe to say we want you back," Cosette laughed. "You're going to have to cut the pity party out, though."

"I guess I could do that," Eponine conceded. "To be fair, I think you've probably been nicer to me than anyone else has ever been."

"No way," Cosette replied. "That title goes to Grantaire for putting up with you," she joked, sinking back into the beanbag chair. A relieved smile spread across her mouth, but she was going to have some choice words for Valjean for taking her chair without asking.

Grantaire and Jehan left the academic building after dropping off their final projects. "Feels so good to be done," Jehan sighed. He threw his arms out and spun in a circle a few steps ahead of Grantaire, who snorted.

"What? I have a really good feeling. Like things are gonna work out or something," Jehan said earnestly.

_How do I let go of a love that meant so much to me?  
How do I go on when you're part of me?  
I'm dying inside each time I see you  
Don't lose sight of me, 'cause you're all I see  
You're still all I see_

"I hope you're right," Grantaire said, absentmindedly digging through his bag for his phone. He still hadn't responded to Eponine's text from earlier. "Should I say anything back?"

"You already have," Jehan said innocently. Grantaire looked up in horror to see his phone in Jehan's palm, and snatched it back. "_I miss you so much, xo. _You know, I can't even be upset you did that because she's clearly going to know that wasn't me, you ass," Grantaire laughed.

"Whatever, it was worth getting a real laugh out of you," Jehan said with a smile. "Besides, I would bet you anything that Cosette's found her. Why else would she leave like she did?" Obviously, all of his reading had paid off; Jehan understood women better than he thought.

Grantaire's phone buzzed again and he recoiled, terrified that Eponine thought the mushy text was from him. He didn't want to push things right away. He was relieved when, a moment later, Jehan's phone buzzed too. "Group message from Courfeyrac," the poet said. "He's reserved the top floor of the Corinth for us all tomorrow for an end-of-finals week party. $20 all-we-can-drink."

"All we can drink? The staff realizes it's _us_, right?" Grantaire was laughing again. All their friends could drink was an impressive amount.

"Sounds like a challenge to me," Jehan said cheerfully. "Told you things were looking up."

_This road to recovery has taken all I have  
It's taken all I have_

-

So…new chapter!

I'm curious as to whether anyone has figured out what song the title of this story is referencing! This chapter is inspired by the song Road to Recovery by Rufio. I've tried to keep the songs sort of mainstream but this song is an old favorite and it actually inspired this whole story in the first place.

Also I probably would have deleted this a while ago without my beta, ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo. :)


	13. Beautiful Mess

_You've got the best of both worlds  
You're the kind of girl who can take down a man and lift him back up again_

At the university, it was a tradition for the graduating class to leave their mark on the school by way of some kind of gift or project. One class had chosen to renovate a few empty acres of property into a sprawling garden, complete with tall hedged walls. Inside, the walls formed a maze of sorts, leading into different courtyards. It was truly beautiful, and it had been this garden that cemented Cosette's decision to attend that particular school. On her tour of the campus, she dragged her father into the garden; she fell in love with a courtyard with a massive fountain in the middle and cherry blossom trees dotted throughout.

On the last day of their junior year, Cosette found herself in this courtyard with Marius. He kicked off his shoes to join a pile of discarded clothing which was comprised of Cosette's sandals and the sweater she had been wearing over her pink sundress.

Cosette was stretched out on her stomach, propped up on her elbows. Her long hair cascaded over her left shoulder, nearly touching the pages of the book she was reading. Marius was lying beside her, admiring her.

"I love you, Cosette," he murmured. A cherry blossom petal had landed on her shoulder, and he tenderly brushed it off.

"I love you," she said back, looking up at him with a smile.

"I can see why this is your favorite part of the garden," Marius said. He hadn't been one to spend time in tranquil places like this, or really relax at all, until he met Cosette.

_You are strong but you're needy, humble but you're greedy  
And based on your body language and shoddy cursive I've been reading_

"It's nice. I feel like I don't have to worry about school things when I'm in here."

"What about not-school things?" Marius leaned in and kissed Cosette's shoulder.

"Sometimes." She looked away from her book again. "Of course, I've been preoccupied with not-school things a lot more than usual, recently."

"I feel like that's partly my fault," Marius frowned.

Cosette closed her book, and sat up. "All of this isn't anyone's fault, really," she said.

"I still feel awful," Marius admitted. "I've tried to apologize to Grantaire but I don't think he even hears me. The closest I've gotten to a meaningful response from him is being told that Eponine is the one I should be apologizing to. I don't think he believes that she forgives me."

Cosette frowned. "I just don't think he wants to hear that she has forgiven you while she is punishing him. I think that's how he sees it. He's not himself right now, Marius. Just give him some time to sort things out with Eponine. I think I talked her into coming out with us later, you know."

Marius leaned against the cool stone base of the water fountain, and Cosette shifted so that she was curled up against him, almost sitting in his lap. "That's good," he said quietly.

"Mhmm," Cosette agreed. She leaned into her boyfriend's embrace, wishing she hadn't abandoned her sweater. The air was turning cool, a sure sign that a spring rain was on the way.

"I missed this," he said. "I've been afraid that I'm losing you."

"Not at all," she replied. "I've just been trying so hard to make everything better again."

"Better with our friends," Marius said. "But are you and I really okay?" Cosette knew what he meant. The night everything bad happened, as she had heard Jehan call it, she and Marius reunited almost too easily. It had been well over a month, but they still hadn't talked about how their relationship was affected.

_Your style is quite selective though your mind is rather reckless  
Well I guess it just suggests that this is just what happiness is  
Hey, what a beautiful mess this is  
It's like picking up trash in dresses_

Cosette and Marius locked eyes. It reminded her of the first time their eyes met, months ago now, and with that one look it was as if the two of them had been hit with Cupid's arrows. Cosette felt almost guilty now for telling Eponine that there was a chance her relationship with Marius wouldn't work out. Maybe that applied to other relationships, but not this one.

"Eponine and I have forgiven each other, but have you forgiven me for how I've hurt her? I'm nervous every minute of every day that you're going to leave me to protect yourself," Marius confessed.

"If anything, this whole mess has taught us that running away from problems isn't the solution to them, right?" Marius nodded. "And please, stop thinking of yourself as this monster," Cosette pleaded. "You both made mistakes. You were scared and under so much pressure. If the situation had been with me instead of her, I'd like to say it would have ended up completely different, but we'll never know that, will we?"

"I guess not," he conceded. He hugged her as close to him as was possible.

That evening, at the Corinth, Courfeyrac and Combeferre stood on the opposite side of a pool table from Enjolras and Grantaire. They arrived on their reserved floor of the bar before anyone else had, so that they could shoot a few games together in the tranquility that accompanied the end of another school year. Tranquility, however, did not suit Courfeyrac well.

"I just don't understand why we can't play strip pool, it's just us," he whined.

Enjolras and Combeferre shared one of their looks where they communicated without talking, and Grantaire barely registered what had been said. He was zoned out, thinking of Eponine. She had sent the lone message to him yesterday, and hadn't answered to what was obviously Jehan's message back to her.

"I just really don't think that's a thing, Courf," Combeferre sighed. "I don't think people do that. What would the rules even be?"

Enjolras chalked the end of his pool stick and tested out his shot. "I can't risk another citation right now," he smirked. "Public nudity probably looks a little less noble to grad schools than disorderly conduct for protesting the-"

"Let me write your grad school applications, I promise I can make the public nudity sound like it's for a cause…PETA maybe?" Courfeyrac interrupted, looking genuinely hopeful. "We can play naked pool for PETA. That can definitely be a thing."

Despite the laughter of the other three, Grantaire barely smiled. He jumped a little when Combeferre clapped him on the shoulder. "Come on, R. I'm sure she'll show up." He had been one of the friends who had been the most understanding of Eponine's absence. Grantaire just nodded. He had been downright jittery from his nerves over the past day.

_Well it kind of hurts when the kind of words you write  
Kind of turn themselves into knives  
And don't mind my nerve you could call it fiction  
But I like being submerged in your contradictions, dear_

"She fucking better show up," Courfeyrac muttered as he went to fetch their second round of drinks. He hadn't liked seeing Grantaire, who was typically one of his most eloquent friends, clam up so badly. Also, it was really hard being the glue that held the group together when he couldn't get the image of Grantaire half-dead on the couch out of his mind.

A few games of pool later, and the four men were interrupted by a loud bang as someone fell on the stairs leading up to their floor of the Corinth. "That'll be Bossuet and Joly?" Combeferre said without looking up from the shot he was lining up.

"Correct," Grantaire said from the spot his feet had practically been chained to since they started playing. He had a perfect line of sight to the doorway and he was reluctant to move. Enjolras would normally have been snippy about having to carry their team, but for this, he couldn't chastise his friend.

Grantaire and Courfeyrac eventually abandoned their game, taking up station at a table with Joly and Bossuet. Grantaire made sure he was positioned so that he could still see the door. Combeferre and Enjolras continued to battle it out over the pool table.

_Although you were biased I love your advice  
Your comebacks ‒ they're quick  
And probably have to do with your insecurities_

"I think I'll probably die of embarrassment if she doesn't show up," Grantaire said after he finished his fourth draft.

Joly looked at him pointedly. "Of everything likely to cause your eventual demise, embarrassment seems the least plausible."

"Fine, but I'm starting to think this is a bad idea, though. This isn't like Eponine. She knows damn well this is more of a party welcoming her back from ignoring all of us than a party to celebrate the end of classes. All this attention; it really isn't her thing. Or mine, for that matter," Grantaire said glumly.

Bahorel and Azelma walked in together just a moment later, earning catcalls from Courfeyrac as they joined the table. As he turned hastily to see what the noise was about, Bossuet knocked a bowl of chips off of the table. "See," Joly reassured Grantaire, "I hardly think you'll be the center of attention _all_ night."

_There's no shame in being crazy, depending on how you take these  
Words are paraphrasing this relationship we're staging  
And what a beautiful mess, yes it is  
It's like we're picking up trash in dresses_

Grantaire shrugged and fetched another round. He couldn't help himself; whether Eponine did or didn't show up he didn't want to be sober. "Have you seen Feuilly or Jehan?" he asked around the table.

"Didn't see them on the way here," Azelma said. "It did start raining out though, maybe they're driving over." Bahorel admired Azelma's fierce sense of loyalty to Eponine, and there was no hesitation on his part when she asked for his company again. To his credit, he didn't pry into Eponine's business either, earning Azelma's respect in return. He put an arm around her shoulder, purposefully resting his fingertips indecently close to her cleavage. Azelma batted at Bahorel's hand. "But, Courf, would it be okay if some of my friends met us up here later?"

"Of course," Courfeyrac grinned. "Your friends are my friends," he said with a wink.

The doorway darkened with the impending arrival of the next group of people. Grantaire's heart sank when he heard Cosette's birdsong-like laugh and she entered the room with Marius. Courfeyrac immediately called Marius out on his _obviously_ sex-tousled hair. While everyone else in the room dissolved in laughter, Grantaire furiously texted both Feuilly and Jehan.

Neither of them responded right away, and Grantaire continued to stare anxiously at his screen for some kind of answer. He prepared for it being a bad answer with a shot of tequila courtesy of their bartender, Fricassee.

_Well it kind of hurts when the kind of words you say  
Kind of turn themselves into blades  
And "kind and courteous" is a life I've heard  
But it's nice to say that we played in the dirt_

Courfeyrac noticed Grantaire's behavior and left the noisy room to call Jehan to see where he and Feuilly were. During his absence, various other acquaintances of the usual guests started to trickle in. Perhaps most noticeably was a friend of Azelma's who accidentally spilled a drink down Bossuet's back within five minutes of her arrival.

Bossuet nearly knocked Courfeyrac over in his attempt to make a quick escape, as he left shouting something about going home to change. Joly blushed slightly, presumably out of secondhand embarrassment for his perpetually unlucky boyfriend.

Courfeyrac sat down in a would-be-casual manner, but it was obvious that he was itching to share some news. "I agree with Joly's earlier statement, Grantaire. You are definitely _not _the most likely to die of embarrassment here." Fricassee chose that moment to bestow a free shot on Joly. Courfeyrac continued, "I did find Jehan and Feuilly, and they want you to meet them outside. Take your stuff," he added.

Grantaire could almost feel the color drain from his face, and his heart ached as though it were made of lead. "They can't even break it to me in front of everyone that she's not coming?"

"No no no no no," Courfeyrac said quickly. "Just go. I promise you won't regret it…I think."

"That's reassuring," Joly snorted.

A thousand different possibilities passed through Grantaire's mind. He nodded in thanks to Courfeyrac, and swiftly snuck out of the bar before anyone else could stop him. He pulled the hood of his dark blue hoodie up over his head before he pushed the door open and exited into steady rain. The sun was just about finished setting, and Grantaire had to squint to make sure his eyes weren't deceiving him.

Feuilly ran past him, giving him a solid thud on the shoulder for what Grantaire assumed was encouragement. Jehan came next and stopped to say, "Just get in the car; we have everything ready for you. Trust me." He pointed to a little teal two-door car with Eponine barely visible in the driver's seat.

_What a beautiful mess this is  
It's like taking a guess when the only answer is "Yes"  
Through timeless words and priceless pictures  
We'll fly like birds not of this earth_

Grantaire felt as though he was in a dream, and he found himself in the passenger seat of the car before he could think. Eponine flew at him, grasping him in a desperate embrace. "I'm sorry," she whispered in his ear. She pushed his hood back down so that she could steady herself with a gentle hand at the nape of his neck.

Grantaire had prepared the perfect response. "I gave you my heart. That's all I can give you. If that's not enough for you, then I'm not enough for you."

Eponine's expression changed from hopeful to confused, but it only took her a few seconds to make the connection. She dropped her hands from him. "Grantaire, we haven't spoken in nearly a month and the only thing you can do is quote One Tree Hill lines at me?"

"I've been watching a lot of Netflix recently," he admitted sheepishly. "But it fucking fits, doesn't it? And you're one to talk. I drank myself into a coma over you and the only thing you can say is that you're sorry?" His words had initially been filled with gusto, but his wit was worn down as soon as Eponine crumbled under the weight of his accusation.

She blinked, fighting back tears. "I don't know what else to say," she said miserably. "I'm sorry that I didn't tell you that I love you back, that I left your apartment that night and that I wasn't there when you got back the next day. I hate knowing it was my fault you were hospitalized in the first place and I hate myself for walking away before you even fucking woke up in the hospital. I'm sorry that I left without really leaving, and I would do anything to prove to you that you are far beyond just 'good enough' for me."

Grantaire's jaw had dropped. He had never seen Eponine so vulnerable before, and he was willing to bet everything he had that this was a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. He wanted to say many things back to her, but his silver tongue failed him. Instead, he simply asked, "Whose car are we in and why?"

Eponine let out a huge breath she had been holding. "It's Azelma's car. She's staying on campus for summer session classes the next few weeks and she insisted I should borrow it."

"You're leaving…like actually leaving the city?" Grantaire nearly snapped. He wasn't drunk by his standards but the alcohol was doing his emotions no favors. "Why did you even bother to come say goodbye just to leave me again?"

Eponine's smile puzzled him. "I was going to ask you to come with me…Jehan and Feuilly packed some stuff for you in case you said yes. " Sure enough, Grantaire glanced at the back seat and was able to pick out his own pillow and a paisley patterned suitcase that could only belong to Jehan.

"Where are we going?"

"I don't know yet, I thought you could help me pick. I owe you, way more than just gratuitous sex and alcohol, in case you'd forgotten." All traces of the sorrowful Eponine from a few minutes ago were gone, and the spark was back in her eyes. "I ran back home and nicked some of my parents' nest egg so money isn't really an issue, for a little while at least. They actually have a mattress stuffed with cash, can you believe anyone still does that?"

_And tides ‒ they turn ‒ and hearts disfigure  
But that's no concern when we're wounded together_

No further words were needed. Grantaire agreed to go down a road neither of them were familiar with by kissing Eponine's pillow-soft lips with his own, gladly letting her tongue make up for lost time. The rain beat a comforting rhythm on the car that instantly became their haven. For the first time in weeks, Grantaire felt the fog of depression lift. It was swiftly replaced with the love he was aching to express, and Eponine accepted this love and all of the unspoken strings that came with it.

_And we tore our dresses and stained our shirts but it's nice today  
Oh, the wait was so worth it_

So…this was the last chapter of this particular story. I'm terribly sorry it took so long to get posted, but I've decided this is the first in a series which I'm pretty sure is going to be titled "City Love." I have the first couple chapters of that written and I plan on starting to post it this weekend. It will be a sequel focused on a different relationship but set in the same verse and same characters.

Big thank you to all the favorites/follows/reviews; they mean the world to me! The biggest thank you of all goes to my beta, ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo. She's been the biggest help ever so you really have her to thank for this too. Also this song is A Beautiful Mess by Jason Mraz.

xoxo


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